DC Brickner

It's a week at this sitting since I completed this essay ... and incredibly, the images continue to appear. I haven't yet begun to figure out this mystery, merely continue to ask: what's the (ghostly) motive?

Worrying about homelessness, even when it's a real possibility, is not the same thing as staring it square in the face and being forced to react. Having done so, here's my suspicion: I'll not be the last of my ilk to go through it.

This is a style of work for me which I hope to periodically continue: "stiletto writing." Yes, it's a rant: yet I've tried to entertainly hurl verbage in such a way as to enticingly slice and dice my targeted focus. "Reasoned" approaches simply no longer work.

The last time I was fired from a job was some 35 years ago. I was working in the hardware department at the May Co. in downtown Cleveland, and ... oh, never mind.

For a little while, anyway, the success of Americans to upend U.S. Congress might actually initiate the beginning of a new era. Regardless how that all plays out, we still have Problems in River City - and TV and film might begin to work for us, as well.

In this "verbal trailer," Book 2 of "The Third Personallity" is laid out, chapter by chapter, with a brief comment added suggesting each future chapter's focus.

Chapter 30 - the final chapter of Book 1: The three primary characters all finally meet in one location. NOTE: From the moment of conception of this story line, I intended to have my two lead male characters meet in this odd fashion. Thanks for reading!

A day of victory, joy and wonder for Mrs. Marston (and her alter ego, "The Rev") begins to slide backwards ... and then collapse. A final communique from "Yam" is recalled, too, reiterating the would-be validity of the "gaseous" entity's earlier prophecy.

It is still 1990 - and Tom Mendelson finally remembers everything unusual out of his youth and early adulthood ... and discovers that his time traveling "partner" is behind just about all of it. In the interim, a terrible event happens to his new friend.

Harley Boggs, exhausted and desperately lonely, has found his life closing in on him, in ever tighter circles. His only fortress against his intruders? His small apartment in Muncie. When it looks like They're coming for him again, he braces, then reacts.

Herein begins the countdown to the last five chapters in this novel ... whose story will be completed in a Book 2 (on the heels of this Book 1). In this chapter, the longest in the novel, Hammie has a regional hit song - with his mom the band's arranger.

The skeletons in the Boggs family's closet continue to tumble forth in this chapter - which was a lot of fun to write. I've never personally been abducted by aliens (I don't think), but Harley has been, and is here. His greatest shock is aboard the ship.

Several years have passed - it's 1987 - and there is "New Age" mania in America (in portions of it, anyway). In the state of Florida, one of the nation's largest actual Spiritualist communities, Cassadaga, outside Deland, enjoys the notoriety - mostly.

This is the "Part III: Awakenings" introductory page - featuring a quote from a 19th Century resident of eastern Massachusetts.

This addendum to "Chapter 23 - 1982: Jane's Illnesses" is set roughly two years later... and went completely unnoticed by the media, and hence the public, too. Me, personally?: Even as a reader, it would be five years before I would learn of this event.

Apart from filling in the blanks left open after Rob Butts' notes (particularly in regards to mostly fictionalized dialogue here), this chapter about his wife, Jane Roberts, is largely factual. Few of her fans knew she was hospitalized in the first place.

All of this chapter's locations - and one of its "support characters," Stephen King - are real. So, too, was the theft of some fallen leaves (by my ex-wife and I, giggling like little kids) from the other side of the fence at the King family residence.

Some prophecies are better than others - and Mrs. Marston's "Message From Space" (by way of "Yam" back in 1964), already shaky, begins to look like a stinker: It's about to come crashing down upon her, her dysfunctional congregation and the Boggs family.

Having finally "hit bottom" - and having hit it pretty hard - Tom is now, seven months later, working on A.A.'s 12 Step Program - replete with a sponsor to help him get through the worst of it: "... coming to believe in God." Could there really BE one?

While preparing to write this chapter, it hit struck me that I had my first-ever opportunity to write an appropriate sex scene, so I gave it a shot. It isn't wildly graphic, nor does it drag on. Anyway: Tom "gets some" ... not that it does him much good.

Hamilton Boggs, Junior - "Hammie," for short - is well on his way to completing his fifth year of life, here in the late 1970s ... and the kid's got a mouth on him. Do "the Christ Reborn" and trance medium Mrs. Marston, the voice for Yam, get along? No.

Tom Mendelson's life has already begun to spiral out of control. As a civilian living now in Hollywood, Florida - just south of his home town - he's very self-pitying about all kinds of things ... until he meets this really great (if atypical) new girl.

Harley Boggs, Hamilton Boggs, Senior's father, finds himself shopping in an old friend's Indiana hardware store for a birthday gift (!) for his toddler grandson, Ham Junior. Something very odd happens, then, on his drive home - only he has no idea what.

Tom Mendelson is now a U.S. Navy petty officer in Guantanamo Bay during his country's late Vietnam era. For years having gone without confusing psi events, Tom experiences his most troubling one to date - one, as it turns out, that's packed with wallop.

This is the Part II Introductory page - featuring a book quote from the future Tom Mendelson.

Enter this novel's final significant character - number 8, Hamilton Boggs, Junior, who proves to be less enamored with his new congregation of followers than they are with him... (NOTE: This ends Part I: "Innocents." Part II, "Woundings," follows next.)

What follows is a peek into the United States of 2075 - in what's perhaps the largest city population-wise in America at that time: Austin, TX. This chapter also focuses on Tawker Hunt, who has an unexpected encounter with some blonde "arrogant" folks.

Finally - the story's title concept of "The Third Personality" is explained ... at least, in part. In addition - not only are all of the four names in the chapter actual historical beings; but because of Rob's note-taking, it's up to 80 percent factual!

As this story enters a new decade - the 1970s - significant characters no. 6 and no. 7 (Harlan and Winifred Boggs, Hamilton Senior's parents, briefly mentioned in Chapter 6: entry [7]) - discover something startling from the past in a keepsake folder.

Hamilton Boggs, Senior, now minister of a new and highly unusual church, gives a sermon to his small congregation... (Many readers may be surprised to find that there were a number of different Christian "millennialism theories" taught late last century.)

...And back again to Tommy Mendelson - College Student, these few years later (in the late 1960s). Here another "psi event" is taking place in his llife ... as Tom finds himself not only flying, but learning all kinds of things about the future - maybe.

Hamilton Boggs, Jr.'s parents meet and begin to bond in this chapter - with yet another "observation" appearance by our heroine. The band playing in the background here was real, as is this setting. Its lead singer, who since died from cancer, is missed.

...And here is significant character no. 5, the possible future wife of significant character no. 4 (and maybe even the mother of significant character no. 8, unlikely to appear for quite a bit yet)...and so on. Is this individual talented? Yes. She is.

Here we introduce significant character number 4: the future father of Hamilton Boggs, Junior - maybe "The Third Personality;" but then, maybe not. Point of order: all of the places (and even some of the characters to come) are actual. So are team names.

In all, there are eight significant characters in "The Third Personality," and this chapter introduces the third of them - one of my personal favorites. To suggest that Mrs. Marston is something of an oddball is an understatement - but is she talented?!

A second major character, in addition to Tommy, turns up in the second half of this chapter - a character encountered in this novel's Prologue [see TTP (1)]. She is there to observe a baseball game - one that actually makes it into 21st Century history.

Tommy goes from fat to normal - thanks to an embarrassing operation. Still, growing up in Fort Lauderdale, Florida during the early 60s is nothing but a charmed endeavor. Then one night, he experiences the first of what will be a lifteime of psi events.

In this second chapter (of 4 opening chapters that largely focus on Tommy Mendelson as a boy growing up in Ft. Lauderdale), a would-be incurable and deadly illness comes into play: in a world where anomalous miracles arrive and depart without much notice.

In this Part I ("Innocents"), a time in America's past is recounted - and in this opening chapter, Tommy Mendelson (perhaps "the Third Personality") is a little leaguer who learns about an American ethic: for in baseball, honor matters more than winning.

"You cannot trust your physical senses to give you a true picture of reality. They are lovely liars, with such a fantastic tale to tell that you believe it without question." - Seth (1970)

I go through moods when I write - and this brief entry qualifies as "venting." This point-of-view is pretty much cut-and-dried here, and harsh. It's time for change. I've had a snootful of witnessing suffering. My hope is my neighbors finally have, too.

All of what follows is submitted by way of explanation - in a humble effort to get past the why's of what I've been writing previously at this website to the wherefores/therefores ... which, given their day in the sun, could well be the fun stuff.

I find it disturbing that insult humor expressed by standup comics and sitcoms is becoming increasingly aimed toward the biased audiences that subscribe to the insults and find them "funny" ... when, in actuality, someone is getting hurt by these attacks.

How great it would be to write social critiques and receive an onslaught of praise, recognition and a big paycheck. But say hello to delusion: critiques are only as good as their alternative game plans. "The Big Picture Project" is offered as a game plan.

Is the concept of a strictly hands-off God a notion whose time has come? Arguably, yes - given the surly state of arrogance of so many now who are convinced (however inappropriately) that they are among God's chosen people. Well - we disagree with them.

With so many unresolved global struggles likely to see to it that our collective heads remain submerged in sand, an ongoing tendency has been (it only makes sense) to blame each other for our mutual lapses. It does makes sense...but for the "mutual" part.

Denial is no longer merely about denying that what's so isn't so - although it still manages to marginalize or obliterate opposing points of view. This new denial doesn't argue against the truth - it ignores it, instead. Its practice is catching on fast.

Each day the news reports one atrocity or tragedy piled atop another across the globe. Allowing that not all of journalism is overreactive, we've all got big troubles, and few meaningful saolutions. Maybe now is a good time to look beyond the symptoms.

Anomalies, or deviations from life's norms, are far more common than they're ever given credit for - and yet we all have a tendency to look the other way when we encounter them. Do they scare us? Threaten us? Yes, if our world views are shaky. They do.

When it comes to defining the nature of reality, almost everybody has an opinion (or maybe hundreds of them). Yet how many of those opinions are based on investigation, consistency and tenability? The speculations to follow, I believe, embrace all three.

As an employee at a Tallahassee, Florida liquor store, I meet two pairs of Middle Eastern males within a week of each other, both of whom behave pleasantly but, well, strangely. With the president's brother living here, one tends to over-worry...maybe.

After failing to find available motel vacancies in three Gulf states in January, I realized it's becoming chaotic "out there" - and few folks seem to know what's going on outside their own regions. A constructive critique for the "Now Agers."