FROM THE "ROAD NOTES OF MAVEN": THE AMERICAN PRIEST

FROM THE "ROAD NOTES OF MAVEN": THE AMERICAN PRIEST, originally uploaded by mavenimagery® Officially Away....

FROM THE "ROAD NOTES OF MAVEN": THE AMERICAN PRIEST
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“Whaddya doin,” shouts the CHP Officer, holding a Ladar in one hand, raises his both hands in the air dramatically: his gleaming ruddy face contorts, his mouth takes a shape of a big O, looking like a Chipmunk with a banana in his hand. “Pull over!”
I do. Then, I voice at Tom. “Image process”
Done.
“Profile.”
“Average Eight among the Five Personality Types,” Tom’s mechanic voice blares. The message is clear “This is my area. Stat out.”
That territorial shit again?
“Not exactly,” Tom answers. “Pussy-Whipped at home but a man’s man outside. Worse in uniform. Becomes boastful and arrogant.”
Omitted for the upcoming full story THE 0.0 MILES

Why’re you taking pictures for?
I look at his name tag. Levine. “For editorial use.” I say in an extreme composure.
Which is?
Who, I say, referring to the magazine Who
“You’ll get a ticket,” Levine says in a hurried manner. “Hold on,” And goes back to the accident scene.
I look at the giant billboard on the side of the freeway which has an advertisement for “JUDGEMENT DAY MAY 21ST 2011”. Under it in italic,Humbly Plead Mercy For Your Sins For Forgiveness”How is this for distraction? Those Pious-Heads are rushing the End of Days before the previous proclamation of 2012. I wondered if driver who is now in a body bag and on his way to the first resting place St. Morgue, was busy reading and pleading mercy when drove off the road.

Rollback to the time when I was in school. The discussion that day was about miracles and faith, about Christ raising the dead and transforming water into wine, feeding thousands with a small amount of food.

Why do we moan complain that the universe is a mystery, that we found no answers?said Mr Paley scanning the room with his totally fiery eyes, his voice low and cultured, easy on the ear.
…How are we to see straight in the darkness when we reject our tool of perception—our mind—and the darkness, on a deep unconscious level, we carry with us into all our deeds? God is the creator and His creative spirit is the driving force in nature and a creative man is walking on God’s footsteps… Jesus is the Son of God, he asserted, looking at each one of us in turn, as we were all leaning forward motionless, eyes focused, then shifted on me.
Rats! Not that ‘birth of a son of God’s’ tale again.
Mr Maven, said Mr Paley, raising his head from the book in front of him, then he looked down again and then up. Perhaps you can relate. Mr Maven is new to us from Carrietwitchet. He grew up in a devout Catholic family. I am sorry about your father. He must’ve been a great man who had vision of God. What do you have to share with us?
Yeah, he is a high-ranking angel in heaven now.
Suddenly the door opened.
Barely student-looking boy walked in, wearing a cap and a leather jacket with chains hanging down his pocket.
Davy Jones! said Mr Paley in a high mocking tone, Join us. Please! Tell us why you are late. Trouble with the carburetor?
You don’t know what one is, he said in a sardonic tone.
Everyone except me uttered a derisive ‘oohs.’
Mr Paley ignored that.
So, where have you been Mr Jones?
I stopped at the bookstore. They’ve got plenty of books on sale.
So, did you buy any?
No, but…I reserved one.
What’s it about?
Murders and executions.
The same ‘oohs’ but higher.
It suits you, he said. Shouldn’t have had any trouble to reserve one, I hope, said Mr Paley sarcastically. I’m certain, it’s the only reservation made ever since it’s published.
The ‘oohs’ got higher and excited, I wanted to join in but I didn’t.
Some books ain’t for everyone, Davy said as he sat next to me.
What are you doing here? I whispered.
He turned to me and said, I like finding gaps in their knowledge.
Whose?
Pious ratfuckers, of course, he retorted. In their humorous and entertaining stories which actually had never occurred in the past, but they tell it the way they saw fit.
I just stared at him.
Sorry about the interruption, Mr Maven. Please, go on—
He don’t have to tell you his opinions and don’ have to hear your Biblical bullshit, interrupted Davy.
Excuse me, Mr Jones, Mr Paley said baffled. What was that you said?
Forget it, Davy said.
I sensed Davy’s anger.
Mr Paley’s claims about the past were coming out to an annoying degree. And what was more annoying was he thought he was offering something valuable, knowledge that no one heard before. It was all that historical scholarship’s habit that gave him confidence to master half of the art of conversation—conversation about Biblical literature. You might be thinking I was being presumptuous here, but really, let alone Davy, who could you take anyone seriously who was attempting to paraphrase old stories and legends from the Dead Past.
No, I’d like to know why wave me off and laugh it away? insisted Mr Paley.
I said forget it, you deaf or something! Davy snapped
No, tell me! He wouldn’t let it. Tell me so I can answer you—
I think I can answer Mr Paley, I put in, making an appreciable nod on Davy’s part. Since he insisted, hoping to embarrass me, hoping that I wouldn’t have something constructive to say.
But my intention wasn’t to put Mr Paley down or challenge him. I was merely unconvinced and puzzled like many others, like the three denied man Freud, Darwin and Copernicus. And I wanted to show Davy I was on his side. Besides, it was one of these impossible to ignore debates.
I mean, which Jesus are we talking about here, for rat-fuck’s sake, huh? I intoned, leaning backward, like a lyric castrati who was about to perform a highly ornamented virtuoso passages in an opera.
Everyone turned to me, wide-eyed, all ears. I looked at Davy as if pleasing to him.
A dark-skinned African Jesus, I continued. A blond-haired Finnish Jesus, an Asiatic Jesus or an American Jesus with a beard and mustache. Which Jesus? Because every society portrays and understands Him in some quite different sense. If Jesus…. did exist then he must have looked Semitic.
To Muslims Jesus is not considered the Son of God. Jesus is the Spirit of God. He was a great prophet who was beloved by God. And God is neither male nor female so I’m thinking he could not have a son. Mormons see God and Jesus as two separate beings. God the Father and His Son.
Brent scoffed in back seat. Yeah, like personal Jesus, man? It’s, like, my Jesus is better than your Jesus, nah, and nuh nah. Where have you been, man? he said loudly, amused by his own joke. Brent was sardonic, and had a certain propensity to seize upon incongruous details, always breaking in with mock innocence. He would leap to outspoken conclusions where others would wait to hear the opinions before revealing their own thoughts. Shortly, he was the Jim Carrey of the class. A real jawsmith. And I liked him for that.
Cut it off, Brent, Mr Paley snapped at him. I’m tired of your waggish wise cracks, and the next time you start in, I’m going to report you to Mr Deacon.
I was pacing, I said.
You, too, Davy
Brent ignored Mr Paley. Shit, once he set the table in a roar he’d have even ignored Mr Deacon.
Musta been in the wrong place. Man, and what’s Finnish, anyway?
I gazed around the class. All eyes were on me now, wanting to know more.
It is a country in Scandinavia, bonehead, I said. Where the sun never goes down in the summer and always dark in the winter. It’s called Finland.
Bullshit, said Brent.
They all looked from me to Brent.
There ain’t such a country where the sun never goes down. You just made it up. Hey! He cried glancing at others. Anyone heard of a such country? Anyone at all?
All shook heads in sprightly howdahs, the ignorant ratfucker yo-yo’s.
So, Mr Fin-land, said the jawsmith, a glint in his eyes, knowing he got the audience in stitches. Tell us where’d come up with a place that don’t exist, huh?
I went on ignoring chalk talker Brent.
And many see Jesus like Buddha, like Confucius as a very great teacher, a Brahma. And why the antinomy between Eastern and Western Christianity, Catholics and Orthodox, or Christianity and Islam?
Janelle’s voice was soft and voluble. She began to recite some lines from Peter Blauner.

‘Why God tempt us with a vision of heaven in the perfection of a child’s face and then condemn us to a lonely wretched existence?’