I was baptized Catholic when I was 23 as friends around me seemed to be at home there. My catechism was Dutch and the time was during the Spring of the Second Vatican Council. At 25 it was difficult for me to reconcile the memorial services for fellow crew members lost in combat with the support of the war by Catholic bishops back in the world.

At 41 I joined the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous and at 43 I took a Masters of Ministry in Religious Education from Seattle University. The two mileposts are well-connected still. Other points in the journey include mindfulness practice and Franciscan alternative orthodoxy. My wife Sherry and I are authors of a textbook in case records for substance abuse records. Interests continue to include history, travel, our two dogs and model building. We live in Port Townsend, Washington, away from what I affectionately call the Dark Side of Puget Sound.

In the beginning of the 1981 version of Excalibur, Merlin proclaims that the sword was “….forged when the world was young, and bird and beast and flower were one with man, and death was but a dream!”

The change from nondualistic to dualistic ways of thinking didn’t originate with Merlin, but this mythos language captures much of where I’m at today. Hopefully I can explore more as posts evolve.