Lessons on the Road to China
The journeys a man undertakes on this lonely orb mark him for life, indelibly, like the tattoos of a Maori warrior, lined and swirled with the imbedded ink of his struggles. Whether we survive these preordained pilgrimages and wanderings rests oft times on our own shoulders, frail though they may be, burdened with care and regret, sloping like the mountain vales of Ashkar, adrip with the monsoonal flow and snows from mountain-born storms. It is in these times of great decision and fate that all of one's character is weighed in the balance. Whether or not we are found wanting depends frequently on those wiles and talents we have cultivated over long years. Such a tale I shall now relate.
   It was in the late 1960s that I had journeyed to Nepal to lecture on the seemingly impossible sexual unions featured in the ancient statuary roof struts of the Jagannarayan Temple in Patan, just across the Bagmati River from fabled Kathmandu. After several days of explanation, aided by rigorous hands-on demonstrations, my exhausted, but excited western audience was at last beginning to grasp these novel and gymnastic methods of lovemaking, notably several of the highly pliable and unencumbered flight attendants from the golden land of California.
   My seminar now being sadly concluded, I made my plans for the arduous trek back to China, where the Chairman had requested my services on a matter I shall at another time relate. As I was preparing to set forth, I was cheerfully accosted by one of the young students who had attended my discourses, a young man who went by the name of Les.
   "Master Akiryon!" he cried, warmly wringing my hand, "I heard that you are hiking to China. I was going to do that myself and wondered if you could use a companion on the road?"
   "Solitary travel is my normal custom, Les," I responded, "but in these treacherous woods and mountains that we must traverse, a doughty companion might be a heaven-sent boon." Little did I realize at the time how true this would prove to be. For the heavily wooded vales on the border of Nepal have long been infamous for their peril. Strange and violent creatures, which the natives name yeti, have been known to watch the roads and waylay hapless sojourners, leaving but remnants of bloodstained clothing on the desolate and rarely trod paths.
   That very afternoon we set off on our trek, my young companion Les being very excited about the journey. As we walked we spoke much of weighty and fatuous matters and I found him to be an apt pupil when explaining the Law of Solubility. Much he questioned me and I was honored by his unfeigned admiration and reverence for my mastery of this delicate and crafty philosophical instrument.
   For the next several days we trudged along the mountain road while the light held, plunging ever deeper into the wild lands. At night we began to hear eerie wails on all sides and occasionally caught a most fleeting glimpse of shapes manlike, though much greater than man-height, on the perimeter of our small fire. My young disciple, Les, began to shiver in fear and by the fifth night the chattering of his teeth was loud in the still and silent dark, broken only by the now all to common, and nearer, wails of the yeti.
  On the sixth day, as the sun began to sink beyond the snowy head of Mount Everest, pillar of the sky, we emerged from the deep woods into a small clearing. Immediately we were faced with a difficult choice. Two roads diverged before us, each plunging back into the eternal darkness of the woods. There being no place to camp for the night, a road must be chosen swiftly. But which?
   "Master Akiryon," Les whispered, his voice faltering as the wind carried the ever closer wails and howls to our frosty ears, "what shall we do? I don't think I've ever been so scared!"
   "Fear not, young Les, I have been in tighter spots than this, and yet I live. Here then is my wisdom: You shall take the left road, and I the right. But do not go far! I shall draw these evil creatures that are tracking us into the woods and lose them. Then I shall shortly rejoin you on the other road. Now off you go and fear not!"
   With that my young companion, Les, gave one last look at me, stuck his thumb resolutely in the air, and bounded away like a deer, disappearing down the left-hand road. He had not been gone more than a minute before I heard a hideous shriek which ended with a long drawn-out scream suddenly cut short. I got up slowly, hoisted my bag upon my shoulder and followed in the footsteps of my gullible but courageous companion down the left-hand road.
   I had gone but a quarter mile when I came upon his torn and bloodied coat, fluttering like a melancholy flag from a great tree branch above me. Alas, the yeti had left nothing else behind. I now knew that I was in no danger as they had taken their prize with them and would be feasting for many days. They would trouble me not again on this journey. As I walked through the silent night I was thankful for my naive companion, Les, and his sacrificial deed of clearing the road for me. Again, the Law of Solubility had stood me in good stead. I would reach China safely and on time for yet another mission of mercy. I mused, as I walked, upon my good fortune:

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one Les traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Dolphins, reincarnation, New Age, philosophy, humor, poetry, teaching, ascended masters, fish, Baba, crystals, spirituality, karma, India, idiots, Akiryon Baba Yat, The Dolphin Sky Foundation, zen, transcendental meditation, past lives, fish, satire, religion, religious satire, sufism, cetaceans, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Eastern religions