TheBanyanTree: My Story - Parial for now

[Monique Colver]

I was raised a heathen, by heathens, though I made an attempt to be all
spiritual or churchgoing when I was 13, and attended a Methodist church for
a few years, just me. I had friends there, and we'd have insane parties. We
went camping at Yosemite, where we smoked, and we'd have car washes to
raise money, and we'd have more parties. We'd go to the winter retreat in
the snow, and drink heavily and smoke. Two different Methodist churches,
but in the end it was all the same -- smoking a variety of substances and
drinking, without much supervision.

Good times.

Once when I was in high school I injured my hand playing handball. It's
easy to do when one is trying to score points and not paying attention to
where the wall is. My dad took me to the ER for x-rays after the nurse
called him -- we didn't have a family doctor, I never went to the doctor,
so we just went to a local place I'd never been to. As my dad was checking
me in they asked, "What religion?" and while I watched my hand continue to
swell I heard my dad say, "Catholic."

What the hell? I thought. I'd never been to a Catholic church, I was most
certainly Methodist, hadn't he been paying attention? (No, he was not -- my
parents rarely paid attention. They had a fun habit of not knowing where I
was, and would often drop me off places at night, and then forget they had,
and I would wait, in the dark, for someone to remember I was out there.
They wouldn't, until I'd find a phone to call and ask them to please
retrieve me.)

Anyway.

Growing up, people often tried to use me as their alcohol courier, because
they thought 1) I looked old enough to pass, and 2) someone had to do it.
My stepmother once had me pretend to sleep on a pillow filled with bottles
of liquor we smuggled into California from Tijuana, because no one's going
to suspect little old sleeping me of harboring illicit liquids, are they?

The best part of going to church for me was always the society of my fellow
juvenile delinquents. Not only would people not pay attention to what the
youth group was doing, they would facilitate our being out on our own. I am
now a person without religion, and I don't mind. It's pretty, some of it,
but I'm happier not trying to fit in to something that I just don't
believe, and I haven't found any group that I want to be a part of. I'm
kind of a loner that way. My stepsister, once she noticed I was going to
church, proclaimed herself "spiritual, but not religious," because being
spiritual was so much better, according to her, and people who went to
church were just bonkers. I've rejected the spiritual thing ever since just
because she annoyed me so much. I do hold grudges.

Now my older sister is devoutly on the side of religion, and last year
asked me why there's a war against Christians. I said there wasn't. My
brothers and their wives now go to churches, sometimes, or at least belong
to churches.

I believe in people, and in the inherent goodness of people. Sometimes I'm
disappointed, because some people really are just psychopaths. I don't
personally know any, because I don't attract anything other than really
nice people, but I know they're out there. I believe we're always fighting
against evil of one kind or another, and I don't care in whose name we
fight it, as long as we do. I believe in kindness and in the freedom of
each person to follow their own path. I don't believe in hate. I keep
finding myself stopping when I'm starting to say I hate something, because
the word itself is just not helpful to me anymore. It's just as well, since
the person who was always at the top of my hate list was me. This way is
better, and takes a lot less energy, something I do not have in abundance.

M








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Monique Colver
Colver Business Solutions
www.colverbusinesssolutions.com
monique.colver at gmail.com
(425) 772-6218


On Mon, Dec 16, 2013 at 1:41 PM, Jim Miller <jim at maze.cc> wrote:

> Since I suggested that we really don't know that much about each other, it
> seemed appropriate that I should tell you a small piece of my story to get
> it started.
>
> I was born in January 1944, right where I live now. Spokane, Washington,
> USA. You can either consider that this is a really great place to live, or
> it's pathetic. There are many reasons I'm still here, but  that is another
> discussion.  I'm the oldest of four siblings. One is adopted. That also is
> for another time. I'll tell you that while my mother was alive, she was
> self-centered and selfish to the extreme. (At least we children think she
> was.) Because of her, I left home at the earliest opportunity. I spent the
> next 25 years hating her, and then realized the object of a person's hatred
> never gets it. It only damages the hater. Too many books in that story for
> The Tree.
>
> My story includes a 14 year old uncle and the things he showed me when I
> was
> 6. I wouldn't even discuss those with a priest in a confessional. That is
> not an open conversation here. After several years fighting cancer, my dad
> died just  after my 17th birthday. He was an exceptional man. I can produce
> witnesses to support that claim. He left an enormous black hole in my life
> that, in recent years has only begun to close. A boy should have a father
> in
> his life to guide him. For most of my life, I told friends that I was sure
> dad died to escape mother. I can fill a book with the short life that he
> lived. Ironic that I watched my dad die an extended and painful death from
> cancer, then personally prayed, Lord, I don't care how I die as long as it
> isn't from cancer. Now I've battled cancer twice, and it's no longer
> important how I die. I'm still not ready.
>
> These things formed me and helped establish the person that Jim is. As I
> have come to understand me, it is apparent that the depth of me is greater
> than I can know or change. Some aspects of me, I embrace. Some I struggle
> desperately to eliminate. The internal battle released by this dichotomy
> often looms larger than my will to continue the fight to change.
>
> I was raised in a toxic religious environment. My maternal grandmother
> carried the torch. We were Pentecostal. We thought ourselves charismatic;
> the world saw us as holy rollers. We had the message right and pity the
> others; so I was instructed. There are a few religions that spend more time
> in church than we did, but not many. I have spent most of my life shedding
> and avoiding religion, and all it's hypocrisy and manipulation. With that
> said, I am spiritual. Spirituality can be defined differently, and I'm not
> prepared or interested in debating definitions. Feel free if you would
> like.
> I believe in a supreme entity; a creator; God. I live with a deep faith and
> believe that my life is lived at the will of God. I believe that my ability
> to know and understand is finite, and there is an existence that regardless
> of my intelligence, I cannot understand. I have set with great intellects;
> men of science and reason, and find it an easy , rational and reasoned
> conclusion; I exist because God existed before all that we know. Science
> will teach that our existence most likely began with a big bang. First they
> will tell you that all matter that is, regardless of form always was. Basic
> physics. Then science will teach that our existence came from nothing. That
> is an unsolvable conundrum. Simply stated, you can't have one WITH the
> other, scientifically speaking. It is not possible, within our know
> physical
> realm, to evolve from NOTHING. All energy must have a source.
>
> Being spiritual, and not religious, I form my own theology, which is a
> hybrid combining the teachings I have received throughout my life, and my
> own experiences. What I find is that my personal theology is fluid. I
> reject
> New Ageism, or a woo woo theology that teaches me; it is all within me and
> I
> can do whatever I decide. That is a long debate that I choose to avoid in
> this discussion. (I do believe that within each person is a large reservoir
> of unknown and untapped resource. For another conversation at a different
> time.) I observe too much order to attribute my life to random chaos. By
> nature, I am a skeptic. There is too much divergence for me to accept what
> any man may say without establishing my own proof. You can ask if I believe
> in supernatural phenomena. I will tell you that I do not, yet in my life,
> many times, I have experienced exceptional phenomena. As I analyze them, I
> cannot always attribute them to luck or coincidence given their obvious
> association with other events. I have never personally experienced anything
> that I am willing to absolutely say was supernatural. Since I cannot prove
> a
> thing, it does not mean that thing doesn't exist. I cannot disprove the
> reality either. I don't believe anyone who says he can. I accept some
> things
> on faith. Faith is the acceptance of that which cannot be known or proved.
> I
> have reached my conclusions. They may change, and over the years, many
> have.
> Those beliefs that I accept on faith cannot be known. I am comfortable
> living my life without some absolutes. What I conclude is that there are
> things I will only know when I know, and it probably won't be in this
> existence; or I may never know.
>
> That lengthy prologue brings me to the heart of this piece of my story. Pun
> intended. Most of you know from past stories that I received a heart
> transplant in 2004. I've written thousand of words telling that story. And
> still there is much that hasn't yet been told. You can probably fill a
> moving van with the books written to tell the stories of other persons
> receiving transplants. I don't know how many there are. I don't care. I've
> only perused a few. Those people felt that it was important to tell their
> story. Good on them. Some day, I may do the same. Lord knows I've often
> been
> encouraged to do so.
>
> I want to talk about the possible phenomenon known as cell memory. That is
> to say, your DNA retains all that you are and have ever been. In a
> transplant, tissue of one person is grafted into another person, thus the
> DNA becomes mingled; thus the essence of one person is implanted into and
> influences the other.
>
> I just completed a thriller/mystery novel by Maggie Shayne. The corneas
> transplanted into one person caused that person to visualize acts of the
> deceased donor. Other tissue transplanted into other recipients caused them
> to take on the evil nature of the donor. Books of fiction with this theme
> abound. Movies have been made and marketed successfully. We like to imagine
> the supernatural. Many in our midst believe. The anecdotal stories can be
> found in abundance. Someone may tell you that they recognized a person who
> had never crossed their path before. They then discover that the person had
> been involved with the donor. Someone else will tell you that they know
> things they shouldn't know, or their tastes in food changed radically. The
> stories and scenarios are endless, and as long as there is superstition,
> they will always exist.
>
> I'm sure thousands of people, possibly millions believe. I expect that many
> organ and tissue recipients believe that their life is being influenced by
> their donor. Are you asking, "What about you Jim? Do you believe in cell
> memory, after all you have mingled DNA?" My answer is no, I do not believe
> that I am in any way influenced by the foreign tissue that was grafted into
> my body. I am the person that I always was and have never experienced any
> unexplained phenomena. I received a heart that was nearly perfect. I do not
> think of it as someone else's heart. It is mine and works a whole lot
> better
> than the old one did during its end life. Some will tell me that it's a
> miracle, and that I should embrace and welcome all that it has for me. It
> is
> not a miracle, unless you count the moment that the doctor opens the blood
> flow and places small spoon like paddle directly to the heart giving it a
> shock. This piece of tissue has been on ice, without oxygenated blood for
> up
> to six hours. The moment of truth; is it still alive; will it beat? Now
> that
> is a heart stopping moment. And then . . . it starts to beat, pumping life
> throughout the entire body. OK, that moment retains all of the mystique of
> a
> miracle. Scientifically, it all goes according to plan. I live everyday
> dependant on a cocktail of potent drugs that prevent this foreign object
> from being rejected; thrown out. This is all pretty predictable science.
> Nothing supernatural about it. No DNA mixing any more that than receiving a
> pint of someone else's blood is going to cause you to do weird things. No
> one ever says that having a transfusion may change you. That is because
> nothing changes. When you graft a peach branch to an apple tree, it doesn't
> magically produce apples. It still looks like the branch of a peach tree.
>
> So, color me a doubter, based on experience, of course. You may feel
> differently. You are welcome to believe whatever you wish. I guess that I
> will concede that there is a miracle in my heart transplant. The miracle is
> that nearly 10 years later, I still reside on the top side of the grass,
> and
> I like it here.
>
> Now you know a lot more about me than you did before, yet we haven't even
> scratched the surface.
>
> Jim
>