Short Stories Previously Published

 

 

 

 

Mermaids Exist!

                                     A Case Supporting Mermaids: The Body Found

 

  When Mermaids: The Body Found aired on Animal Planet in May of 2012, it stirred all sorts of controversy.  The first reaction from many viewers was that the program staged a hoax to attract viewers.  A few viewers of the program embraced the information as a true finding in that such mythological creatures exist.

  The ocean is a vast and complex body of water with depths and caverns so profound it is truly undisturbed by the probing of mankind.  New species of animals are discovered every year in the depths of African jungles, abysmal waters and other remote locations less frequented by human beings.  It comes as no surprise there very well could be a ‘sea-ape’ as the scientists from the program defined.

  Throughout every culture which has been studied by anthropologists, there has been the reoccurrence in motifs, scrolls, cave etchings and statuary of a half-human, half-fish creature.

  Some American Indians have lore telling they were guided from Asia to North America by a human/fish benefactor when he took pity on them for starving.  The creature was spectacular and terrifying to behold, as it had a green beard, green hair, and a face like that of a dolphin.  Its tail was split and would have looked like two scales covered, footless legs.  (1).

  In modern times the cups of coffee enjoyed from Starbucks have this very emblem imprinted in green on them—a logo inspired for the first Starbucks, taken from an antique woodcut design.  The original Starbucks in Seattle, Washington is the only place you can view the full dual tail of their green mermaid logo.

  Seattle, Washington and its surrounding area is the next stop on the tour of mermaids emerging from myth to reality.

  In their documentary, Animal Planet goes on to reveal footage of two teenage boys from Washington who captured evidence on a cell phone’s recording device.  The video is a one minute and fifteen seconds tape of a body washed up on the beach with its face buried in the sand.  One of the boys pokes its wiry fingers with a stick of driftwood and they flinch.  Seconds later a bluish, greenish man-like creature raises its head and lets out an unworldly bellow sounding off like a high pitched scream combined with a long gasp for air.  The creature grabs at the boy’s hooded sweatshirt; all that is seen at the end of the tape are sneaker-clad feet running through sand.

  Scientists have illustrated over the years how human beings evolved from the sea.  The human body is 70% water, and when it becomes dehydrated, illness and death can approach rapidly.  Tears are of a saltwater gel-like substance, and some slight web between the toes and fingers remains as part of human configuration.  A second type of cave-man could have evolved over time.  Rather than they come out of the sea and become land-dwellers, distant, pre-historic ancestors may have evolved into a second type of caveman which did not live in a terrestrial cave, but adapted to live under water in a sea cave.

  The next argument put to the team of the Animal Planet producers was the fact that the U.S. Navy confiscated skulls, bones, weaponry and DNA samples the scientists had discovered in the belly of a shark.  The Navy allegedly took all evidence from the researchers; even the high-pitched recordings they had captured from undersea tapings of the calls of the mermen.  The question was raised: Why would the Navy prevent the scientists from coming forth to the public with these new findings?

  The existence of a new species of man could be a threat to human beings.  Human beings have proved over the centuries they can’t accept other humans who are a little different, be it color, race, creed, or religion.  How can mankind in general accept the existence of another species which may be more intelligent than themselves? This could substantiate a great threat.

  Even in Hollywood films anything which is intelligent employs some type of threat to mankind.        

 Films showing aliens as the ‘bad guys’ have been more popular than most other types of alien films.  A war must always be waged to defend the human race from intelligent ‘monster-like’ beings whether they are space aliens or a blob.

  E.T., The Extraterrestrial was an example of what could happen if there was such a creature.  It would have to be hidden, locked up in lab, and kept a secret from the public to prevent causing massive alarm.

  A good example of mass hysteria was on October 30th, 1938, when a radio station broadcast a script from “War of The Worlds,” announcing the Martians had arrived.  People fled their homes screaming, while others packed their cars and fled. (2).

  The entrance of a mythical creature into the world could cause people to hunt the creature and drive it from its habitat, therefore disrupting seawaters. Some other possible outcomes could be they become terrified to go near the beaches or behave erratically while traveling marine waters.

  The existence of mermaids is a highly likely theory that extends far beyond Native American legends or the split-tail mermaid on a paper coffee cup.  Mermaids have been recognized as a symbol worldwide for perhaps, thousands of years in folklore and literature.  The question is not ‘are there mermaids,’ but where do these creatures come from?  Are they universal symbols of the subconscious minds of man such as angels or religious figures which appear in times of great duress as they have to weary seamen or those about to sail toward a storm?  Are they apparitions which appear from another world as ghosts do?  There is evidence in the belief of undines or water spirits in many cultures, which protect and heal. (3)

  The existence of other intelligent species not only offends and confronts the human race, but it also challenges many religious beliefs.  Ghosts have been denied existence by many and especially denounced by most conventional or modern religions. Contact with the deceased could mean less religious seekers. Churches have preached the possible outcomes of life after death for hundreds of years.  After all, who needs to fear death if one can easily find conversation and reassurance with those already departed?

  Like the elusive ghost, the existence of a ‘sea-ape’ or intelligent life-form could be highly likely if not even probable. The Ghost Adventures crew and other like programs have been allowed to collect evidence with scientific equipment on public television.  The ghosts, however, lack organic existence and the ability to pose much of a threat to our reality.  They only challenge religion, for the most part.  The mermaid, however, having been recovered and pieced together by a team of scientists, displays organic life-form evidence.  The body recovered was from a recent finding in a shark’s belly, so therefore this is not something uncovered by archeological means and demonstrates this creature exists in the virgin depths of the sea.

  A cover-up is inevitable and media censoring has now come into place.  The facts for veiling such a discovery would be to protect a rare species or a people from being hunted, and to protect the public from being terrorized by the wonderment of such a species.

  One final conclusion to be stated in arguing for the validity of Animal Planet’s mermaid discovery is the fact that people will first acknowledge what they don’t want to contend with and then put it away where no one else will be able to interact with it.  The people who demonstrate this fact the greatest are the American Indians.

  Indians are an intelligent species of humans which were gathered up and forced into a restraining area almost like a concentration camp.  Today’s Indian has become an enigmatic figure which symbolizes myth and magic.  He has been shut in and put out of society, yet lingers in the backdrop of life as a type of outcast.  His way of life was stripped from him for the excuse of protecting ‘settlers.’ Had the settlers not went plodding through his lands unannounced, thus frightening and causing the Indian to go into a state of defense, there may well have not been such bitter blood between the two peoples.

  Such is the case with the mermaid.  People have trod upon its territory on many occasions and caught it by surprise.  It has found its way into unwary fishermen’s nets and made approach to the sandy beaches of the wilderness.  The general populous can choose to acknowledge its presence, or to turn its back, sigh, and simply cast a blind eye for it never existed but as a subconscious arch-type.  Whatever the choice in letting the mermaid exist, it is there, it has always been present, and will continue to be in the backdrop of our symbols, dwelling in their watery caves for as long as the earth and seas remain.

 

 

 

 

Afterword: I raised the comparison of American Indians to the mermaids as the mermaids were found in the program to build tools to spear fish and to fight with.  They were caught on a recording speaking a dialect, and also conversing with or speaking to dolphins.  I view the mermaids not as monsters or creatures, but as a tribal people, based on the research I viewed.

I also raised the comparison to aliens—another obscure creature so many people witnessed, yet it has been a failed effort to present them to the public.

 

 

Resources:

1. Creatures in the Mist: Little People, Wild Men and Spirit Beings Around the World: a Study in Comparative Mythology

Author: Varner, Gary R.

Date: 2007

 

2. War of the Worlds Radio Broadcast Causes Panic

By Jennifer Rosenberg, About.com Guide http://history1900s.about.com/od/1930s/a/warofworlds.htm

 

 

3. Cited: Water spirits are one of the most widely recognized “otherworldly” creatures in the world. Reported in most every land throughout time, these nature beings are benign and mischievous, helpful and deadly.

Creatures in the Mist: Little People, Wild Men and Spirit Beings Around the World: a Study in Comparative Mythology Author: Gary R. Varner Date: 2007

 

4. Starbucks article:  http://www.starbucks.com/blog/so-who-is-the-siren

5. Animal planet program: http://www.travelchannel.com/tv-shows/ghost-adventureshttp://animal.discovery.com/tv-shows/mermaids/videos/mermaids.htm

                                        The Vampire Defined

 

 

  In the early centuries of England ‘vampire’ was a very easy label to cast on foreigners because they were different, spoke strange languages and had special customs.  In old England (and other parts of Europe) people didn’t always take kindly to outsiders, feared them, and didn’t particularly like them around.

  Today, there still exists many stereo-types, but the best comparison is simply people whom one may meet which put on a really good ‘front.’ 

  Like Dracula, they saunter into your life from a strange land, speak with a charming, fluid accent and mesmerize almost everyone into thinking what an outstanding, trustworthy, good-natured fellow he is.

There’s always that one person, though, that wants to be really close to him, takes an interest in him and wants to see what’s below the surface.  This individual goes poking around in ”Drac’s” back yard looking for his past, and observes some behavior no one can see for all the staging and smoke screens, finesse and control over his environment. 

  Even though the suspected “Drac” doesn’t sleep in a coffin and is on a beach soaking up rays, (and not even sparkling!) there’s still something not quite right.

    The investigation moves forward, and it is discovered this suspect has been there all along to charm the dollars out of our pockets and drain us of our time and energy.  When that one spy confronts Dracula with his now obvious underlying ulterior motives, he rubs his nose in a circle with the palm of his hand and scratches his chest.  He’s getting nervous.  Then he proceeds to place his hand over his heart, looks into the eyes of his confronter and says, “I really don’t have any idea about that.  I’m not sure what you’re referring to….”

  Take this black and white film still, for example.*  The vampire is creeping into the bedroom when he thinks no one is looking, and he’s ready to drain this poor woman of her very last sustenance.  When he is finished, he will be moving right along to the next one.  Don’t think you’re his Bella Swan--or if you prefer Anne Rice, his Nicholas--for you will only be his lover at that moment.

  Suddenly and without announcement, Aunt Dot pops into the bedroom to tell her darling niece goodnight and sees her guest, Mr. Dracula, hunching near the bed.  What will happen—how will “Drac” talk his way out of this? 

  “No need for alarm, darling.  I was only about to tuck the blankets about the sweet girl’s arms,” Dracula politely concludes.

  No further attention is given to the sleeper.  In a moment Dracula has clicked his polished heels, and in a single glide, extends his arm to Aunty Dot and asks, “Would you like to join me for a little drink in the parlor?—or perhaps a bite before bedtime?”

  Delighted, Miss Dot slips her hand into the keyhole of his bent arm and he leads her, sauntering along down the staircase into the parlor, snapping his fingers for the maid.

  Vampires are people who drain our lives of happiness and energy, relieve bank accounts of their dollars, and practice thievery of affections not earned.  Vampires may not drink your blood, but will likely give you the feeling that you have been given the slip, lost your money, energy, and heart while pouring over this charismatic manipulator who may well have psychopathic tendencies. 

  Real vampires in the sense of folklore and Hollywood’s inventions have not been proven to exist; there are no undead, super-humans slipping through an office corridor or deserted shipyards on moonless nights.  However, people who have all the charm and attributes of vampires, psychological control of their surroundings and situations, and who use those elements of power to the point of abuse, are indeed real.

   While strolling in the mall or walking through a park, take some time to observe.  They may not be obvious at first, but the compelling man or lady on the park bench or behind the lipstick counter could just be awaiting the next victim to use for their own means. 

  The dictionary definition of vampire is ‘one who drains others of their sustenance.’  In older versions of the Webster dictionary the definition states a more mystical type:  A deadly ghost who haunts one’s dreams.

  Now, how many vampires do you know?

 

The Ghostly Presence

They say the state of Texas is overflowing with ghostly presence, and indeed it is, so I found when I lived there in the '80s.

 When I was very young I came to know that I had a unique sense of the world, particularly that one of the invisible. When I was four, I could feel the 'presence' of my deceased uncle, who died December 17th, 1965, at the age of seventeen, just three weeks after I was born.

 "Bob Hope," he said to me, in a dream.

 My mother and grandmother were astounded and anxious when I looked at my uncle's high school graduation picture, laughed, and said "Bob Hope." This had a particular meaning to them.

 When my mother was carrying me, she used to watch Bob Hope with her brother on the TV, and they would laugh. This was not told to me, and I had very little understanding of anything at four years old. My grandmother asked me why I would say that, and I explained he had said this to me in a dream. The memory has survived me through time as my relatives have reminded me, even after forty years has past.

 There came more premonitions, prophetic dreams as I grew older, but the intensity of it all was overwhelming shortly after I moved to Brownsville, Texas.

 I had an encounter with the ghost of a person whom I had never known or had even seen a photo of. When he came into my life, he brought others.

 They say, according to writings old and new, that when a ghostly presence enters your life, it will open the floodgates for others to come in, and I found this to be true. It is like becoming a lighthouse for which wandering spirits come to your beacon. Unless this is experienced personally, it is very difficult to make others understand what it's like. For those who have experienced the 'presence' of watchful eyes it is all too familiar and we come together in kinship.

 "The ghost," we will call him for now, came to know me, I believe, long before I was aware of him. I was lead to believe this later as I often seen him in my dreams at the house I had lived in right before going to Texas-the house on Edgewood Drive in Eaton, Ohio. He revealed the knowledge he had of my life when I was young, of friends and family members-but only the ones I was very close to.

 The ghost first appeared to me when I was staying with friends in Brownsville. He had known the woman and her family I was staying with, and I believe this made him a little more trusting and comfortable in revealing himself. I had been feeling his presence and his watchful eyes. He would turn the light switches on and off in my house, and he especially liked the washing machine and would open the lid. It was not until that one night, though, that he stepped out of the shadows, into the sunlight of my dream world, and introduced himself.

 I was confused and frightened at first-I had seen the ghosts of dead relatives in my dreams, but not of anyone I had not known in life.

 "Why am I seeing him-what does he want," I asked myself over and over.

 He told me to call him, if I wanted him, by his nickname, "Melo."

 I didn't tell anyone about the dreams for a little while, and I had begun drawing pictures of him as well as scenes of places out in the country side of Brownsville, and other people who later appeared with him in the dreams. The Mexican family I'd been staying with, in which whom he had known, was a family of 'brujos' or witches. They were spiritual people, and completely understood things of the otherworld.

 I showed them the pictures I had drawn, and they were able to identify the people, as well as the 'the ghost' himself and confirmed that indeed he was a living person who'd died a few years ago.

 After I told them, this revelation greatly upset my ghostly friend, and when back at my house and in bed, I was awaken by him and his father, 'Pancho,' along with a short, aged Indian fellow they called 'don Chonito.' (Later I found that don Chonito was a shaman who had taught Melo herbs, medicine, and magic).

 It was three in the morning when they came through my bedroom window. The glass shook and there was a hard thud at the foot of my bed. Melo explained that he didn't want me to voice to the woman or her family any more of the things he had been telling me. He said they were bad people and her brother went to jail for killing someone. He showed me a photo of her brother and when I woke up, I drew the photo from memory.

 I showed my lady friend the drawing and told her "Melo said you have a brother and this is him."

 She poured over the drawing and with a very dry rasp said, "Yes, that's my brother. He's in jail. He was accused of shooting someone."

 Melo was not at all pleased that I told her this and he disappeared for a couple of weeks after scolding me. When he came back to my dreams, he said I needed to trust him.

 It took years of practice and faith for me to do that.

 

 I left the Valley for a few years and went back to Ohio, but I continued to have dreams and be visited by Melo, who was most always accompanied by Chonito and Pancho. Little, by little, piece by piece, he revealed his life to me. He explained that there was something he wanted me to have-a book, a diary he'd written, and it was buried out on some property in San Benito.

 I moved to Laredo in 1992, and while I was there I began my search for "Melo."

 On the weekends, I would drive to Brownsville and conduct my secret investigations.

 I wanted to find some evidence of his existence in the world. I could not present his family with my knowledge of him for fear they'd think I was mad, so I set out to find what I could, but mostly I wanted a photo of him. He seemed much averted to me getting a picture of him, and I never did happen upon this most coveted item for many years.

 I first went to the college library in Brownsville where I found his obituary on a microfilm. I printed it and saved it. I found an old archive that recorded him as a business owner in 1961 in San Benito. I copied it and saved it. The biggest feat was yet to happen.

 He had told me earlier about a book, a diary, he'd written. I was staying with the same family I had stayed with years ago when I'd lived in Brownsville, and before I went to sleep that night, I softly called his name for the first time, as he had told me to do, if I wanted him to come. " Melo...."

 He didn't appear in my dreams until two weeks later when I was back in Laredo. It was then he showed me how to arrive at the spot where the book was located. I went back to Brownsville that weekend, and in the early evening in that month of May, I went to the vacant piece of land in the San Benito countryside.

 I had a very peculiar experience there, too strange to reveal here and much too lengthy, and I am grateful to this day I returned with the book and some other items without being spirited away. The book told of many interesting medicines I believe to be formulas from Northern Mexico, as well as much other fascinating information also too lengthy to write here.

 I had his obit, I had his book, a religious medallion, but I wanted more. I wanted to find his grave.

 The woman I was staying with had known him and knew where he was buried. I went that following day in the early evening, about four O'clock.

 I parked on Cemetery Road and found myself in a country-folk cemetery that was both eerie and unsettling.

 I stood there, outside the gates of the Sabas Cavazos Cemetery, feeling so many emotions and sense of familiarity although I had never been before. I didn't find Melo right away. He didn't want me there. He'd told me 'he didn't want me to see him like that.' I violated his request again.

 I entered, glancing over all the graves, most with statues of saints, rows of candles around them, even stuffed animals and sea shells, empty plates and liquor bottles on some. The painted statues of saints glared at me for such an intrusion of an otherwise happy, tranquil garden of bones.

I found him. He was helpless in the material world to stop me. I was not prepared for the flow of emotions I would experience there, nor the event that was about to take place shortly after. His grave was perfectly covered in a bed of thorny weeds, and when I knelt down to look closely at the plaque with his name, birth date and day of death, I was stabbed by the stickers and bled from the cuts they'd poked in my hands. I could not keep the tears in and they flowed into the parched dirt around the stone in the ground. Then I realized I had been given passage to something very special all those years he had visited me. I had shared my life with an existence, a person, even though no longer living and I had grown quite fond of him. In fact, I believed then, I had loved him.

 After a time, I stood up and brushed my hands together. Before knew it I was on the ground again, on my back, laying right over the top of the grave. I saw him there in the sunlight, the ghostly presence of my dreams, Melo.

 A gunshot was fired and a bullet hit one of the stones in the graveyard right before I hit the ground. I was terrified-it all happened so fast. I raised my head from the ground just enough to see a black truck taking off and caught three of the plate numbers through my tears. I was shaken, and I went back to my friend's house only to find that truck was sitting in her driveway.

 It was clear to me I knew something too much, and someone wanted me dead. They wanted me dead, the ghost seeing freak who was able to extract and beguile such information from the spirit world. They didn't want me to tell.

 That night Melo visited me and he said, "I told you she was no good."

 When they learned they had not killed me after all, that I had only fallen, they came after me in Laredo. I left a few months later and married a Jewish man whom I'd met at a writer's conference once in New York City. I lived in East Elmhurst, Queens for ten years thereafter.

 Even through the marriage [which ended up a disaster] I remained in contact with Melo. I wrote a book about my bizarre life in Brownsville and had it published.

 

 When the marriage ended I found myself in Nashville, Tennessee for awhile. I was looking for work, and one day I received a call for a job in San Antonio, Texas. I flew down on a plane for an interview. I didn't think anything would come of it. A few months went buy, and one afternoon I was laying on the bed half asleep, and the hallway of my apartment appeared to yawn and stretch into an old-world market place. A Mexican girl, dark-skinned, pigtails and worn clothes looked at me and said, "San Antonio." I fully woke in a panic. When I got out of bed there was a small clipping of paper on the floor that had the words San Antonio on it.

 I went back to sleep for more troubled dreams-I dreamed a stream of blood was being poured over the train trunk where my drawings of Melo and the others were kept. I turned, looked back, and don Chonito was sitting on the trunk. "Regresso," he said, meaning, 'I come back.'

 I received a phone call and a very generous job offer a couple of days later, and I found myself back in Texas within two weeks. I had then come full circle.

 After I settled in I began the search for the final, most coveted item, the Holy Grail of articles: A photograph of Melo. I was able to get in contact with people over the internet-well-aged people he had gone to college with in the Fifties at Texas A&M. They were happy to arrange for me to get the picture. On the day of November 7th, 2008, I received three photos of him in the mail.

 In the quiet of my office, my hand over my heart, I looked at the first picture, already knowing what I would see. The drawings I had made were him-he was older, though. The photos were when he was in his mid-twenties. I was betaken, completed and finally, at peace. This was the ghost, the man, who had visited my dreams. He was real, had been real, had lived in this other time, a time before I was born, a time when I was little, and he'd died when I was fourteen.

 

 I know he has my heart in a way no other in this world or the next can ever hope to have it, and he always and forever will have my heart, and possess me as no other can.

 I had a locket made that weekend with his name engraved on it; I put the best photo in it, along with my father's photo, as he had died just three months prior. I almost always wear this locket, and the picture of Melo hangs on the wall next to my bed, above him a crystal rosary strung from a wall-shelf where the Virgin Guadalupe rests.

 Life is as much a mystery to us in modern times as it was in the Paleolithic times, and death even more so. Even grander is the mystery of love and it is most extraordinary to have one's life touched by it, and the unseen world, all at the same time.

 I still dream of him to this day.

 

This is a small collection of stories I've had published as articles and later posted on Yahoo Voices.