The lady vanishes

Well, no - I don't mean myself, although anyone who has been reading this blog would be excused for thinking that... ;)

Just like you, I do have a life - or two - beyond this spot of a blog.
Which is why all the amazing stories I've been itching to tell you will have to wait some more. Today, I am going to share just a very short story from a wonderfully entertaining and informative website that is among our favourites.

It was contributed by a man who calls himself "Dave".

Here's what Dave said:


"A few days ago, I was behind a girl, walking down the stairs, in the subway. Reaching the bottom, she turned right, around the corner, into a dead-end subway waiting area. I did the same and she was not there. I was about two seconds behind her, and there is no way she could have gone from view. ..."


The rest you can read here.

There are a few instances of such disappearances in previous posts, here in this blog. (See some of the March entries.)
Be sure to read them, if you haven't already.

Better yet, if anything like this has happened to you, make sure you don't disappear back into the ether of your off-line life without letting me know. ;)

A bubble in the flow of Time

Time is of your own making,

its clock ticks in your head.

The moment you stop thought

time too stops dead.


Angelus Silesius, 17th century

Considering how long has been since my last post, you would be excused if you thought I've gone to Bennington, Vermont... :)

I wish.
But no. I have been around, just not in Vermont.
Time has its way with us regardless of where we are.

Or does it?

Here is a story you might find interesting.

***

ESCAPE FROM TIME

The great thing about time is that it goes on.

Arthur Eddington

"Although theologians and philosophers wrangle over the technicalities of the logical relationship between time and eternity, many religious people believe that the most powerful insights into the subject are provided, not by academic debate, but by direct revelation:

I remember that I was going to bathe from a stretch of shingle to which the few people who stayed in the village seldom went. Suddenly the noise of the insects was hushed. Time seemed to stop. A sense of infinite power and peace came upon me. I can best liken the combination of timelessness with amazing fullness of existence to the feeling one gets in watching the rim of a great silent fly-wheel or the unmoving surface of a deep, strongly-flowing river. Nothing happened: yet existence was completely full. All was clear.

This personal story, recounted by the physicist and Anglican bishop Ernest Barnes in his 1929 Gifford Lectures, eloquently captures the combination of timelessness and clarity so often said to be associated with mystical or religious experiences."

***

Now that gives a different meaning to the expression "flow of Time"...
I wonder what Leonardo (da Vinci to you) would say to that.
Here's what he did say about water as a metaphor for time:


"In rivers, the water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes, so with time present."

(from LEONARDO DA VINCI'S NOTE BOOKS)


Regardless of his many - and truly great - talents, time ailed Leonardo as much as it ails any prince or pauper of this world. It seems - but I may be totally wrong - that the one thing Leonardo missed was "mystical" - or, if you prefer - profoundly spiritual insight into the nature of... well, nature. Nature as an appearance, a semblance - an illusion.

It cannot be blamed on his era, even though its defining feature - its "humanism" - relied on a fundamentally flawed foundation: the premise that man is the alpha and omega of Creation (by implication making man's faulty interpretation of the sensory input as "all there is" a generally accepted standard of "reality") .

After all, even epochs deeply steeped in "humanism" could not prevent "mystic" insights by individuals here and there. Angelus Silesius, the author of the opening quote here, was such an individual: an extremely interesting individual.

Still, I cannot blame Leonardo.
But that's yarn for a different story altogether.
In fact, I am already sorry I mentioned it here.


Anyway, the story of bishop (and before that scientist) Ernest William Barnes and the accompanying text are an excerpt from a fascinating book I would recommend reading to anyone despairing over the apparently irreversible "flow" of time:

A petrifying forest

I've always loved forests - even as a metaphor - and stories about them, especially enchanted ones. I dont know why, but the sheer concept of »enchanted forest« just sounds somehow right to me. Maybe my subconscious knows a lot more about the real world than my conscious mind does. And »metaphors« may be just half-forgotten truths and facts about the essence of things.

Which is why I was somewhat surprised when I discovered a story about a »forest« I had never heard about: a stone forest in Peru – and »inexplicable« at that.

It's called Marcahuasi (or Markawasi, in the English transcription of the indigenous word), and apparently it is famous among the local population for offering strolls way beyond a normal hike in the woods...

The »forest« itself is worth decades of exploration.
(See here. BTW, does it remind you of anything...?)

But here is the story I wanted to share with you today, because it's directly related to the topic of »time slips«. I am quoting a part of it verbatim, as it was told to Scott Corrales by Raul Rios Centena:

"Several months ago, a patient came to see me about a serious case of hemiplegia. The patient claimed to be 30 years old but was unable to prove it, stating that she'd lost her formal identification card. It was a very strange case of hemiplegia, since upon examination with a CAT (Computerized Axial Tomography) scan, there were neither areas showing bleeding vessels nor any traumatic lesions.

When I began asking questions about the case, the patient told me the following: 'I was at a campground in the vicinity of the ancient stone forest, Markawasi, when I went out exploring late at night with some friends. Oddly enough, we heard the strains of music and noticed a small torch-lit stone cabin. I was able to see people dancing inside, but upon getting closer I felt a sudden sensation of cold which I paid little attention to, and I stuck my head through an open door. It was then that I saw the occupants were clad in 17th century fashion. I tried to enter the room, but one of my girlfriends pulled me out.'

The patient was tugged out by one of her friends, and her body became paralyzed in half precisely as she was drawn out of the 'stone cabin'. My conclusion is that the probable cause behind the hemiplegia is unknown. No medical test was able to ascertain its cause. Nonetheless, an EEG was able to show that the left hemisphere of the brain did not show signs of normal functioning, as well as an abnormal amount of electric waves.

Many Peruvians claim having had contact experiences in Markawasi, while many scholars indicate the existence of a dimensional doorway. No conclusive proof of this exists, of course. Some friends, myself, obviously, and others who have visited the stone forest can attest to the existence of a strange kind of energy. According to those persons having knowledge of this subject, dimensional doorways tend to open and close not necessarily in specific places. The patient is currently undergoing physical rehabilitation in Lima's Arzobispo Loayza National Hospital.

The unanswered question is, of course, what would have happened if her body had entered completely into the stone cabin? Would she have gone into another dimension? I suppose the truth shall be known in the fullness of time."



I suppose it will.

At this point, I have only one question: how did the subject know that the clothes were "in the 17th century fashion"? It's a very specialised piece of information. Of course she could be just that: a specialist, or at least a highly observant "lay" person with a lot of knowledge about the history of clothing. It's not unheard of.

Meanwhile, you can read the rest of the article here.

Or, if you prefer a full book, here's the one for you: