perfect.'
I could almost see Karl's razor-sharp mind racing furiously. 'Are you saying that to this Macro self everything is perfect? Things like poverty, disease, injustice, death, and even selfish micro men Like us?'
'Yes,' I nodded, 'because they are perfectly balanced, and a positive and a negative that are equal cancel each other. Such things as poverty, disease, injustice, and death only exist at the micro levels-never at the Macro level of awareness. That's what the mystics meant when they said that all is illusion or maya.'
'But it's a damned real illusion to all us micro beings!' Karl retorted.
'Of course,' I replied. 'Who could enjoy an exciting play unless he could temporarily forget that he was just watching actors and actresses playing parts written by an author whose purpose was to entertain?'
'So you agree with. Shakespeare,' Karl inserted. 'All the world is a stage and all the men and women only players who, in their time, play many parts.'
'Yes, I do. The essence of a good actor is that he temporarily loses himself in his part. The same with micro man. He has temporarily lost himself in a part and forgotten that he is the only one who chose it! That's why there is no injustice from the larger perspective, because each soul has chosen every part it plays.'
'Are you sure, Jon, that everyone is eventually going to wake up from their amnesia and realize that their true identity is God?-what you call the macrocosm or Macro self?'
'Well, that's what all the mystics have been saying as far back in history as we have any record.'
'And do you really believe in this sort of philosophy?' Karl questioned. He looked anxious and concerned as he said, 'Let's be practical, Jon: If you believe in reincarnation, astral bodies, and time travel, how are you going to be a social psychologist? Our professors sure as hell aren't going to accept these wild ideas.'
'Okay, I'll answer those questions,' I said and realized I was pacing the floor again. 'First, the basic concepts of Macro philosophy are not new to me and have always appealed to me. My greatest objection was the micro one that they didn't seem practical. Now I think that a Macro philosophy might be, in the long run, the most practical philosophy I've ever come across.
'As for being a social psychologist-I don't deny the validity of the micro view of man as a highly evolved symbol-thinking animal completely determined by his heredity and environment. However, I am not going to reject a Macro dimension which includes the micro one but adds the concepts of soul, karma, reincarnation, and the ultimate macrocosmic view which sees all as one indivisible universal mind.
'Now, for my professors and fellow behavioral scientists, I accept the fact that in their opinion no one can be a real scientist and believe in a Macro philosophy. So, if they find out I'm even considering these concepts, I won't be a social psychologist as far as they're concerned. I'll be a mystic nut who can't tell the difference between hallucinations and reality.'
'But,' said Karl, 'you don't have to let anyone know that you're dabbling with ideas like reincarnation and Macro philosophy. You've been hitting the books for almost three solid years, and you haven't once taken a vacation. It's no wonder you get an escapist dream.'
'Then, you think my dream is part of a mental breakdown due to overwork. So you're going to supply psychotherapy for me if I'll just keep my mouth shut and not talk to anyone else about my deranged ideas.'
'Now, Jon, put yourself in my place,' Karl pleaded. 'Just imagine that I came to you and told you all the things that you've told me today, and I admitted they were all based on a dream that I'd had the night before. Be fair, Jon. How would you react?'
I couldn't help laughing at the thought of Karl talking as I had. I said, 'Okay, Karl, you made your point. If you came to me with the same story I'd say you were nutty as a fruitcake. But you've always been the hardheaded realist. I've been the philosopher.
'Besides, I've always been fascinated by dreams, and you've never even bothered to remember yours.'
'What you're saying, then,' Karl replied, 'is that you've always been the type to go off the deep end over some crazy dream. Jon, you're too close to finishing your doctorate to take chances like this. I'll be glad to listen to you, no matter what you want to talk about, but don't discuss this with anyone else yet. Okay?'
'All right,' I said. 'Maybe you're right. Maybe it was all just a wild dream. I'll test that hypothesis tonight when I go to sleep.'
'Now that makes sense,' Karl said with relief. 'Look, I have to go. I've got an appointment with one of my students, then a date with Cindy tonight. If you're asleep when I get home, I won't wake you up.'
'By all means, don't wake me up! I'm going to bed early tonight to see what happens.
'By the way,' I continued, 'I wrote down most of the details of my dream. I thought the organizational structure of the Macro society might interest you. It's all in the notebook over there on my desk. If you don't some in too late, you might glance through it.'
'I'll do that,' Karl said, and left for his office.
The blowing snow held an invitation that I couldn't resist. I hate the snow, and I love it. So I bundled up and went for a walk that ended in the university library. There I spent a couple of hours looking for books to support my hope that there was more to my experience than just an escapist dream fantasy. I failed.
Around nine-thirty I went to bed, yielding to an almost embarrassingly strong desire to see Lea again, if only in a dream. As I lay there waiting for sleep to come, I amused myself by reviewing the' strange details my dream computer had given me on the structure of the Macro society and its strange metric. time system:*
*See C.I. Data Excerpts.
The more I thought, the more I wondered if maybe Karl was right. I had read about people making up their own world when they could no longer cope with their existing reality. Maybe I should take a vacation.
No matter what position I tried, sleep simply would not come.
About midnight Karl and Cindy slipped quietly in. I faced the wall and feigned sleep so as not to intrude.
Soon I drifted toward sleep and was awakened by Cindy's muffled giggles. 'Damn it!' I thought and moved my pillow over my head as Karl, said, 'Quiet, Honey,' in a hushed voice.
The sound of their rustling about on his bed across the room was hard to ignore, but I did, and once more slipped into the edge of sleep. I sat up startled in my bed. Cindy had let out a shrill squeal.
There they were, stark naked. Karl was nibbling on her ticklish inner thigh-right there with me in the room.
'Damn it, Karl!' I cursed angrily. 'Don't you have any respect for the act?'
Karl looked up, as startled as I had been, and, as Cindy gathered the blanket about her, his expression changed from surprise to amusement.
He grabbed Cindy, blanket and all, and said playfully, 'Hell no, Jon! We're ballin', we're not in church!'
Cindy's apology was drowned by the voice of my own inner conflict. 'Karl's right, you know,' my evolved self was saying. 'There's joy and laughter to be shared making love with someone you care for. It's wholesome. It's healthy. It's good.'
Then my judgmental unevolved self came on with its rebuttal. 'There's nothing wholesome about Karl out there naked with someone he's not even thinking of marrying. Or for that matter, her naked in front of him here in his-no, our!-bedroom. What kind of girl is she– anyway?'
Then the response, 'Oh, get with it, Jon. She's a super person, bright, thoughtful, and fun. You know that. There's nothing wrong with them sharing a perfectly natural expression of caring and sharing. If you were as bright as you think you are, you wouldn't judge them. You'd just be happy for them.'
'Happy for them, indeed! I'd never do that sort of thing,' the argument continued.
'Oh, you wouldn't, huh? Maybe you're just a little bit jealous of Karl's lack of inhibition, his freedom of expression.'
And so the contest went till either they got quieter or I fell asleep, or both. Anyway, I– woke up Thursday morning at. my usual time with no memory of even the trace of a dream.
January is miserably cold in New York, and this month was no exception. It had been eleven, snow and slushfilled days since my strange dream experience, and while I had remembered a few dream fragments, none of them ever approached the level of my 2150 experience.
Did this fact support Karl's 'escapist dream' theory or negate it?
He was worried at first and spent a little more time at home than usual for the first few days. When my nights failed to turn up any more such bizarre responses, I guess he finally decided it was all just a very therapeutic
