Two remarks directed my way on the Coconut Telegraph blog of bigpinekey.com, followed by my replies.
[Sloan] Have you ever considered Hollywood? (Ed: He’s been on the Today Show 3 times.)
Actually, Ed, only once on the TODAY Show, once on CBS Morning News, twice on CNN. And around 250 local/regional radio and television shows.
Hollywood it was not. That stuff’s pretty much all made up.
However, one of my novels might make a great movie. A dream set it all up, as follows.
In late April 2001, I arranged to hitch a ride out of Key West with a world-known street performer named Gazzo. He was headed for Boston and I was tagging along. The night before we left, I dreamt of a street performer wearing a black derby hat on a six-foot unicycle showing me how to do my own street act.
When Gazzo picked me up at Sippin’ Internet Cafe the next morning, he said he wanted to go through Helen, Georgia on the way to Boston, to see Birdie McClaine, a street performer friend who performed in Ft. Myers in the winter and Helen in the warm months. No problem. I was in no hurry to go to Boston, or wherever.
When we reached Helen a couple of days later, we went to the town mall to see if Birdie was performing. Yep, and he had on a black derby hat and was up on his 6-foot unicycle, juggling. I was not just slightly alert. After Birdie wrapped up his act, we had dinner at the nearby Chinese restaurant. Then we headed up to Birdie’s place in a retirement sort of campground a few miles outside of Helen.
The next morning Birdie came to me and said Gazzo had said I write books. Yes, I said, I had written many books. Had I ever written a novel? Yes, three. Did I want to hear an idea he had for a movie that first would need to be written as a novel? Yes, I said. When he told me the story line, I nearly fell out. I had lived a good bit of it the year before. Birdie nearly fell out when I told him the dream I’d had in Key West.
I said I could write the novel, but I had no computer and needed a place to stay. Birdie said he would get me a tent, I could use the community shower and bath, and a computer in the the Helen library. No problem. I started the book later that day. In six weeks it was done. It wrote itself, and often I was guided at night in dreams about how the next day’s writing would go.
Birdie and I were halves on the book, if it ever made money. We named it HEAVY WAIT: A Strange Tale. In late 2006 it was published by PublishAmerica.com, an online publish-to-order firm. I gave several copies to the Monroe County Library system. I seriously doubt I will ever have another novel as good come through me.
When it was being written, I kept telling Patrica, the woman I was courting in Helen, that it was being written by God. After reading the manuscript of the finished product, she said “It was written by God!” Hollywood is interested in a tale written by God?
Here’s the second comment from the Cononut Telegraph.
If Sloan wonders why people think that he is a lunatic, perhaps it is because he writes about his dreams and literally believes that his dreams are some sort of revelation from God. I have wild dreams, too but I do not bore readers with my dreams or present them as some sort of divine sign.
In the summer of 2004, when I was back in Helen, I was told in my sleep, in plain English, “You need to dream, Sloan, so you will know what is really going on.” What set that dream up was two Helen amigos were pushing me hard to go to a doctor and get a pill to stop me from dreaming. After I shared the dream message with them, they quit trying to persuade me to go to a doctor to get my dreams stopped.
In the spring of 2006, I was told in my sleep, in plain English, “Remember Daniel.” Then, same night as I recall, I was told, “Like but not greater than Jesus.” That was just before I entered the county commission race against George Neugent, when I lived on Little Torch Key. It was dreams that caused me to enter that race. After some time passed and I decided not to run after all, it was dreams that got me back into the race. Not long after that, Dear Ed and I were linked up by Steve Estes, Editor and Publisher of the News-Barometer on Big Pine Key. I received just over 7,000 votes in that race, despite the fact that it was known throughout the Keys that I relied on my dreams.
It may interest you, Doubting Thomas/Thomasina, but then maybe not, that I’ve had several wives who learned sort of the hard way not to poke fun at my dreams. Relatives and lots of friends, and lots of enemies learned the same thing by dreams I had about them, which I shared with them, not always to their great delight.
There are numerous reports in the Bible of people having dreams that were messages from God about them and/or other people.
The most famous Bible dreamer was Daniel, whom I was told not to forget. He interpreted dreams, his own and other people’s. In one case, Nebuchadnezzer had a dream that he forgot. He knew it was important and had lots of reputed wise men try to remember the dream, then interpret it. They had no clue how to remember the dream. Finally, Nebuchadnezzer turned to Daniel, who prayed on it and remembered the dream, which Nebuchadnezzer confirmed on hearing it from Daniel. Then, Daniel interpreted it: a warning to Nebuchadnezzer: if he kept boasting about how great he and his kingdom were, all his own doing, he would end up on his hands and knees grazing with cattle for seven years. He didn’t stop boasting, and the dream came true. After the seven years ended, Nebuchadnezzer was restored and all he then could do was sing praises to God’s greatness.
I could go on and on, but would you believe any of it, Doubting T? Maybe, if you are scientifically inclinded, you should read of the autobiography of the Swiss psychiatrist, C.G. Jung, MEMORIES, DREAMS AND REFLECTIONS, proof that a world-renown medical doctor, who today has a huge international following, was convinced dreams have a great deal of meaning.
Maybe I also should suggest, Doubting T, that your dreams have loads of meaning, but you don’t know how to interpret them. I go even further and say your dreams are screaming cries from your soul for attention to matters you need to be dealing with, blended with messages from angels assigned to look over you.
Even if you don’t believe me, maybe someone else watching on will benefit from this interchange. Very often people who are asleep are used to help others wake up, while the sleepers just stay sleeping. That’s why I often use in posts what other people say/write to me. They volunteered at the level of soul to help others, even though they get no help themselves.
The upside, Doubting T, is you remember your dreams, while many people do not. Because you remember your dreams, you have a golden opportunity to leap spiritually. It might not be a leap that is comfortable for you, as spiritual change seldom is comfortable. But it’s certainly available to you, if you want to go in that direction.
If you read this post and the same day/night then have a dream, describe the dream in an email to me. keysmyhome@hotmail.com. Maybe I will be able to tell you what it means.
While mulling that offer, consider this about 911, which the From the Right guy sometimes rehashes on the Coconut Telegraph.
While I was in Helen in 2001, I was asked in my sleep, in plain English, “Will you make a prayer for a Divine Intervention for all of humanity?” I woke up, startled, said, “I ask for a Divine Intervention for all of humanity.” Two days later, the Trade Towers came down in New York City.
While Americans were reacting in shock, horror and outrage, Patricia and I were put into a state of grace. We hoped America would make a very different kind of response than it would want to make. We knew a military counterstrike would be go very bad for America, which proved out after America invaded Iraq and Afghanistan, and the insurgents then came roaring in. The later decline in the national economy caused by President Bush lowering taxes while he fought two wars deepened America’s downwars side. As did the body bags and the maimed in body and/or spirit coming home, and the resulting soul trauma experienced by their families and friends.
One year to the night after I was asked to make the prayer for a Divine Intervention for all of humanity, in my sleep I was asked if I would make the same prayer again. This time, I made the prayer in my sleep, and ended it with, “and let it begin in me!” Oh me, oh my, was I then turned every which a way but loose! There is no getting around the fundamental rule: if you want the world to change, you first have to be changed yourself.
What you do with this, Doubting T, is your decision, no sweat off my back. I’m supposed to show you an entirely different perspective from the one you now have, which probably isn’t much different from the perspective I had before God shanghaied me in early 1987.
How I survived what came after that I can only say was God’s doing, for no way could I alone have survived it. I sometimes wonder if some of what I experienced should be made into a movie, or maybe even a series, but I have no contacts with the movie industry or publishing firms that do.
Maybe a producer, or director, could use the poem last below to set the tone of a film. It pretty well sums up the trip I’m on. It kept coming to me during the recent Open Mike at Sippin’ Internet Cafe’s Sunday, so I read it to to the audience. It hatched in one burst on June 7, 2004, after I had dreamt at dawn of facing a big mountain I had to climb over instead of taking the easy way around it. Then Patricia stood before me and said, “Sloan, you need to go back to Helen.” And so I did.
The mountain, or one of its relatives, kept coming back around, and the poem, too. At Sippin’ the other night, I had to stop reading it a few times, to let the waves of emotion pass through me. I seldom read this poem to other people, when I don’t get choked up a few times. “Without repentance” in the poem means: you can’t get out of it.
“SHANGHAIED”
A calling to serve carries its own wisdom,
which legitimates both the calling and the serving
so that the two are one:
Only the one called to serve
can know this wisdom,
and for some who are called
the knowing comes easily,
while for others the knowing is a fiery baptism.
Each calling is different,
and while some callings can be declined,
others cannot,
and those whose calling is without repentance
know they are in it for the duration of the calling,
and while others may try to persuade them out of it,
the calling for ones such as these always prevails;
thus is it advised to all called for keeps
that they view their calling as a blessing
even when it seems at times to be a curse,
and that they try to reconcile the loss of their captain status
and allow the Spirit of God to man the helm of their ship,
and be glad and willing crew members thereon,
knowing that all sailing ships of souls
need a crew as well as a captain
to maintain and navigate the ship through
seas of many tones, depths and flavors;
so consider each league sailed
as part of the overall journey
going to where the captain deigns to go
by using whatever winds and sea currents available
to navigate the ship to the experiences
this ship and crew need to have
in order to fulfill their calling and its wisdom
revealed by the journey of many leagues,
many known only to the ship and its crew,
all of whom come to know,
some sooner than others,
that after they are conscripted
there is no safe jumping ship.
Sloan