23 Skidoo!
Last night I was on Robert Anton Wilson's website, staying up way too late. I decide it's time for sleep. I wonder what the date is as I slide my mouse pointer over my computer clock. Time: 3:23, date: October 23. I get a quick head trip on the infamous number 23 as I shutdown and go to sleep.
- A garden party in my back yard. I'm eleven years old and while the adults get buzzed on red wine I climb the big oak tree. I climb way up into the skinny branches as the weak ones tumble down to the ground under my probing sneakers. I get to the very top of the tree and poke my head above the sand. I scramble up the side of the hole and back out onto the beach. It's a sweltering day, and the waves glint transparent green in the sunshine. I'm twenty-one years old and am slowly learning the power of magick words. In my head, equations made of words calculate themselves. I speak and walk out onto the back porch. I get the feeling that someone needs my help so I place my wine glass onto a red and white table cloth and walk down under the big oak. I look up and see a young child just as a two foot section of branch falls towards my head. I hear a warning from someone behind me as I bat it away easily. Then I am out of body and a clean white sheet of paper appears on my mind screen with a single equation typed out. It is a function of one magick word, which equals a sequence of numbers streaming down the page. I hear Robert Anton Wilson's voice telling my it is the formula for reality control. With understanding of it, one may turn any universe into a lucid dream. In the hypnagogic state between waking and dreaming, I understand the formula perfectly. In fact, I realize, I wrote it myself.