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I was born in October, 1941 in Orange Grove, Mississippi, USA. right next to US Highway 90, and near the railroad tracks, with a swamp in our back yard.

Growing up was easy enough, but the nights were spooky and we didn't get out of bed at night much... fearful of the boogy man, and who knows what might be lurking outside.

It was wartime (WW2) and my mom and her sisters, brothers, cousins,and parents all worked at the Navy Ship Yard, or Moss Point Paper Mill helping in the war effort - leaving the kids in the care of our adorable black maid: - "Dora"

Dora had a boyfriend, it seemed, and she would talk about how he treated her, and complain a lot. She also told us kids some fractured fairy tails, mixing her experience with the Mother Goose stuff, all ending in the phrase:

"Went around the corner, stepped on a pin,
the pin bit,
and that's where that lie went!"

I really loved Dora, just as much as my mom.

She would spend her days cooking, washing pots, clothes, scrubbing the children (standing in a #3 wash tub), and floors, - just about in that order.

Fresh biscuits, grits and eggs for breakfast, greens and corn bread for lunch, and sometimes fried chicken and potato salad for supper, but most of the time it was biscuits, and re-fried grits with anything available, and sometimes hamburger meat. Meat and butter was rationed by the War Department.

Anyway, our family did ok. Mom, and her sister Unis (we called her: "blackie"), both divorced, and all their children lived together in this old doctors office - store front building, with pecan trees next door, and oranges in the groves across the rail-road tracks. A little one room church was just behind us and also next to the swamp. There was alligators and black water snakes in that water, and once, I was told, under the church.

At night, the kids, 3 or 4 to a bed, would, as needed, pee in a pot next to the bed, most of the time, but some of us boys preferred the back porch, doing it together off the edge of the porch plank-boards, as it was more daring. The warm humid air was full of noise from bugs, frogs, and unknown things in the swamp.

I remember, as an infant, crawling on the plank floor and looking up at the big fancy radio with it's red light shining brightly in the dark room. At night, the whole family, and some neighbors would sit around the radio and hear the war news, or comedy programs. On Sunday it would be blue-grass or gospel music.

It was scarry, indeed. There may have been a boogy-man, but I never had nightmares over it. We were well schooled in religion, and knew, as Dora would say:

"The Lard always looks after the little childs, and protect them through the night - if we said our prays."

Which, of course, we did, diligently.

I was a day dreamer and a very shy child around strangers, which were few in number.

We played hard all day around the house, and under it with blocks of wood... imagining them to be fine cars and army trucks.

Yeh, we were poor folk.

For us kids, candy was our only hope of achieving success in life, and anyone who delivered it up to the hungry yungins was a saint, indeed. We had uncles, anties, and mothers who would hug you, kiss you, then finally hand over the chocolates or "all day" suckers. The trouble was well worth it.

Toward the end of the war, my family got to move into a shack behind my grandmothers house in Kreole, near the Moss Point paper mill. Grandpa's house was a company house with big windows, screen-in porches and indoor plumbing. My sister and brother stayed with someone else, so our little three room house was big to me, and so clean and neat. I sleep in my own bed. That was because of my bed wetting, I guess. I was 5 or 6 years old.

That's when the dreams started.
And I mean dreams.
Flying dreams.

One dream, which was recurring, for months on end, was like this:

I was sleeping, and then I would wake up, get out of bed, and stand quietly, gently bowing my head slightly, relaxing fully, and yes, surrendering...or kind of falling into the arms of someone safe and comfortable. It was so familiar and easy, and I got used to doing "it" during this time, for the results was well worth the effort! I flew up and away, and visited many lovely places, maybe I got some candy also.

After I actually woke up, sometimes in the middle of the night, I would run into my mother's bedroom and shout to her:

"Mama... mama, watch me, I can fly!"

I would then proceed to relax, and do "it". But to no avail, I could not make it work for benefit of here witnessing this special heavenly adventure of mine.

This happened many times, and mother got tired of it. I did too, after a while.

Ok, now it's not so great, this dream-flying stuff, but as a little boy, with absolutely no particular future prospects, it was a Grand Adventure, literally out of this world.

Well . . . folks . . . , yes, I know the meaning of those dreams.
It was not the content of the dreams, but the surrendering it self.

And, yes, I knew well the meaning of "it" when in 1968, in Berkeley California, at Bovie's ballet studio (the Subud Group's one room latihan hall), after hearing the Opening words from the helpers. . . and the word "B E G I N. . . ."

I collapsed immediately , crawling around on the floor, crying like a baby, a child of God. Powerless, hopeless, delighted, heavy, light, sad, elevated. . . and in great need of help, and direction in my life.

Then the - "finish".

My next latihan. . . well, that's another story.

I did not have to wonder about what the Latihan Kejiwaan of Subud was all about that "opening night", for getting the thing started had already been taught to me as a child, and the familiar nature of it and the family-feeling of being taken care of was very apparent indeed:

This o'boy was sure about one thing:

Something - out there...
looks after little boys deep into the scary dark night,

and also looks after big boys, and big girls too...

as my dear loving Dora would say:

"The Lard always looks after the little childs,
and protect them through the night
- if we said our prays."

amen.

with love and good will to all,

farlan

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