Dark Mysteries

         Halloween conjures images of night and darkness.  Bats and black cats, witches, vampires, zombies, and other creatures of the night are offered up to frighten us during the Halloween season.  But the most frightening  or most puzzling mysteries of the darkness are the ones that we can read about everyday in the newspaper.  Here are three that I read about today:

Mitrice Richardson

      "She's afraid of the dark and always has been," said  Latice Sutton, the mother of Mitrice Richardson.  Mitrice Richardson was arrested on the night of September 16 after she refused to pay a bill at an upscale restaurant in Malibu, California.  Witnesses at the restaurant said the petite 24 year old black woman had begun acting in a rather odd fashion.  Police were called.  They admininstered a sobriety test and determined that she was not drunk.  After finding marijuana in her car they arrested her and took her to a nearby sheriff substation and impounded her car.  Latice was processed at the station and eventually released.  Her mother was going to pick her up later that morning, however for some reason Mitrice decided to leave on her own on foot saying that she was going to meet friends.  She is a doctorate student in Clinical Psychology who had recently graduated with a 4.0 average. She was a past beauty pageant contestant who has a good job and who is active in her community.  Why she was behaving so strangely that evening is indeed a mystery. But what happened after she left the police station at about 1 AM the morning of September 17 is perhaps a bigger mystery.  She disappeared and has yet to be heard from.  There have been a few reported but unconfirmed sightings.  What was going with Mitrice that night?  And why would a young woman who was afraid of the dark take off by herself in the darkness of the early morning in a place far from her home.  Where is Mitrice?

Amy Farris

         A beautiful, talented violin player, Amy Farris was a session musician who had played with many great artists and was highly regarded in the music industry.  She had come to Los Angeles from Austin, Texas to further pursue her music dreams. Amy was part of a new musical group, Dave Alvin and the Guilty Women, and the future was looking promising.  Then on Tuesday September 29 she was found dead in her home.  It was most probably suicide, but investigations are underway to confirm this.  I do not know anything about Amy Farris other than what the papers stated, but her story is just another of many other talented people who end their lives.  Year after year we have read of people who seem like they should have everything to live for but end their lives. What darkness overcomes these lives to make them end them?  It is a darkness I do not understand.

Andrew Garcia

        Little Andrew Garcia, 4 months old, was just innocently being fed when he became just another victim of Los Angeles area gang insanity.  It was in the darkness at about 1 AM Sunday morning September 27 in Van Nuys.  He was in the backseat of a car being fed by a woman, not his mother, who was also shot and sent to the hospital.  Andrew however was shot in the head and died.  Another man was also shot but he was apparently not to seriously wounded.  The police did not specifically attribute the incident to "gang violence", but all indications were that everyone involved had gang affiliations.  I personally don't understand this gangster mentality or why there is not more pressure to eliminate gangs.  Of course we have wonderful organizations like the ACLU to protect the rights of gangbangers and many of the gangs have the money for top notch legal defense.  The innocent pay the price for the freedom of gangs to exist.  Gang culture is a darkness that casts on ominously evil shadow over the future of our nation.

            There are many awful things that happen under the cover of night.  And the evil darkside of the human soul can cast its shadow no matter what the time of day.  This is why each of us who despise the evil dark need to shine our lights for good.

Silent Night, Eerie Night

          Halloween now looms ahead like the big orange harvest moon creeping over the horizon. It's the first day of October and the festive event is now thirty days away. It also means Christmas is coming!  But we'll focus on Halloween before we get the yuletide holiday. I don't like to refer to Halloween as a holiday, but rather an event or an occasion or  a festivity. There is no longer much of a Holy Day significance to the day other than its past relationship to All Saints Day and All Souls Day.  Most churches in this age do not particularly like to hype the day of Halloween.  Many churches indeed plan carnivals or celebrations related to the secular nature of the day, but instead giving their events names like "Harvest Festivals".  Many churches try to avoid the associations the day has with evil, occultish realms, and darkness.  However, darkness is not always bad or evil.  Sometimes darkness can be quite beautiful.
         In the case of caverns and underground spaces within our amazing Earth, darkness is a natural occurance.  Sure we often think about the fearsome side of these dark places. There are bats and other frightening creatures of the dark.  There are the very real fears of becoming lost or trapped in these nether chambers that have been so wonderously formed by God and the forces of nature.  The fear makes us more cautious about being there.  But to visit a cavern that has been developed for the purpose of public visitation, such as Carlsbad Caverns or Mammoth Caves is safe and well worth anyone's time.  There are many caverns open for public viewing  that are either run by  government agencies or by private owners.  The facilities have many safety features in place that minimize any danger, but at the same time give one the sense of being in a very dangerous place. Yet more people are injured or even killed at an amusement park like Disneyland or any other park in a year's time than in the entire public life of a cavern. The wonders of God and His creations are unparalleled by any manmade schmaltz.  If you have never been in a cavern, and are not ridiculously afraid of natural things or walking, make an effort to visit one of these natural wonders next chance you get. There are 100's of caves to visit in the United States and throughout the world.  If you want more information here is a great website:
http://cavern.com/

         One of my oddest experiences with the darkness of nature came in a visit to southern Idaho's Craters of the Moon National Monument.  Craters is a vast lava field which is something like 750,000 acres of black basalt flow.  The terrain looks like a moonscape thus the park's name.  It is an incredible place to visit.  Craters is not crowded like many parks elsewhere-- probably less than 200,000 people visit during a years time-- so it is a nice place to experience solitude.  I believe I was there in July sometime in the mid 1980's.  My wife and I spent the afternoon driving throughout the park scenic drives. Then we pitched our small tent in the campground.  It is not a particularly large campground and it was by no means full. During the evening it was much like other campgrounds with people walking, talking, and having their dinners.  Then a very strange thing happened-- it got dark.  Keep in mind the ground in the campground and for miles around is all black.  So when it got dark, I mean it got dark like in no other place I had ever been.  And with the darkness came silence -- totally no sound whatsoever silence. It was as though not just the lights had been turned off, but the entire world had been shut down.  There were no campfires like one normally sees in a campground. Fires weren't allowed and there was nothing there to burn anyway.  There were no happy campers sitting about in lantern light. There was a sudden darkness and silence as though the world had been abandoned. 
         I tried not to move for fear of making a noise that might shatter the silence.  My wife and I communicated in the softest of whispers at first, and then eventually did not say anything more for fear of being heard.  There was no moon in the sky.  We were on the moon-- on the dark side. The enormous sky was silently still and perfectly clear to display the millions of pinpoints of star light. The stars did not shimmer.  They were just there and quiet.  I pondered the scene above and around me for a while and then, as quietly as I possibly could, went in the tent to sleep.
          The woods and mountains can be very dark places at night, but there are always sounds.  The breezes through the trees, unseen creatures, the spashing streams, and a myriad of sounds joining together in a nocturnal chorus.  The darkness at Craters of the Moon combined with the stark silence was totally alien to me. Although somewhat discomforting, it was beautiful, awsome, amazing. I have never since returned there, but hope to someday.  I doubt whether I will ever camp there again since I don't really camp anymore, but who knows.  I am glad I did camp there that  one time.  Indeed, darkness and silence can be so beautiful.

Walking In The Dark

        Halloween is associated with darkness.  The main activities of Halloween are in the evening. The events usually include some sort of "haunted" attraction that is dark or dimly lit. The mythology and imagery surrounding the occasion mostly deal with graveyards, spirits, witches, vampires and other places and creatures of the darker realms.  Halloween celebrates the night.
        I got to thinking about this last night as I walked around in darkness.  My wife usually goes to bed much earlier than I do, so when I am coming to bed I keep the lights off as much as possible so as not to disturb her sleep. I shut off the lights in my home office and prowl through the darkened house as I make my way to bed.  At first, before my eyes have been able to adjust to the change in lighting, it seems very dark. Then gradually I am able to realize that it is really not that dark at all.  Light from the outside filters through the closed blinds. There are many red, green, or amber lights from appliances and electronic devices and clocks throughout the house. I am amazed at all of the various lights that remain on always. Momentarily I recall hearing on the Southwest Radio Church program one time that the government of the "Beast" that will one day rule the entire world will be able to "watch" everyone in Big Brother fashion through the electronics that are always on in our homes. Pausing, I wonder if they could see me in this darkness.
          I enjoy walking around the house in the dark.  In a way it seems like an exercise that helps increase my visual acuity as well heightening other senses. I walk carefully so as not to hurt myself or knock anything over. A few times I have painfully banged my toe making me more careful about where I direct my steps. I pride myself on my night vision.  Walking in the dark house is like practicing for being blind or having a severe visual impairment.  I hope it never happens, but for short periods I get some sense of what it would be like.  I like being able to see well so I want my eyes to be healthy, but walking in the dark can be a challenge.
          As a matter of fact, I've always liked walking in the dark.  Back to the idea of the challenge in one part, but also the feeling of mystery and fear and sense of peacefulness and solitude walking or just being in the dark sometimes offers.  To be in a darkened room, not sleeping, but just resting, reflecting, and meditating can be immensely restoratitve to the soul.  The womb-like retreat of a dark place can feel safe and sheltering.  Usually you can see in the dark as we usually encounter darkness like as when I am walking around the house.  It's not like the demonstration of real darkness that cavern tour guides in places like Carlsbad Caverns give you when they will at one point turn off the lights. That's real darkness. Back when I was in my 20's my friends and I would sometimes engage ourselves in spelunking--cave exploration--and almost always at some point we would turn out our lights to experience the darkness.  If we would have ever lost our lights, then that would have been true terror.  True blindness.
         Once, in that same era of my life when I was still living at home with my parents back in Tennessee, my friend Fred (God rest his departed soul) and I decided to hike to the top of the Chimney Top peaks in the Smokey Mountains to see the sunrise.  Fred spent the night at my house and we got up about 3 AM and drove to the Chimney Tops trailhead.  It was a couple hour hike so most of it had to be done in the darkness in order to experience sunrise at the summit. I had attempted the hike twice before in the daylight.  The first time my friend Marvin and I somehow got off the trail and ended up on a different trail where we came upon some other hikers who had food and shared their lunch with us. We never made it to the Chimney Tops. My second visit with two other friends reached the intended destination and it was then I decided that one day I would return for the sunrise. When Fred and I made the trek we did so without flashlights. The darkness was especially intense on the trail because it was totally forested. We walked carefully.  The trail was visible enough to follow but all around us was the ambiguity of the dark, silent mountain forest. We had a goal and persisted until we reached the top.  The sky was lightening with the dawn and the cool August morning air was still with anticipation.  We found some rocks at the pinnacle and waited.  Then, as though God were speaking to us, the sun appeared along with a grand whoosh of the wind.  It was breathtaking and the two of  us watched silently.
           I like to walk in darkness, in the literal sense, as long as I can see a little bit and I'm not totally blind.  If I can see something in the darkness and have a pretty good idea of where I'm going, then I know that if I am careful I should be okay and get to my destination safely. However, often I think we all walk in darkness in the figurative sense.  We may lack spirituallity, God, love, friendship, knowledge, wisdom, or whatever makes us more enlightened or goal-oriented in our lives.  We walk with uncertaintity, loneliness, sadness, and fears that cannot seem to be assuaged.  That is not a pleasant darkness in which to walk.
            Some oft given advice for trick-or-treaters since they will be out walking in the dark is that they should carry some sort of light.  The light is not really intended for the trick-or-treaters to find their way through the streets. Normally there is enough light  for everyone to see where they are going in the streets of the neighborhood.  The light that they are advised to carry is so that people can see them.