...

(There is a large blot where a pen rested for a long enough time that the ink seeped into the paper).

I can't.

Waiting

Sri Vivekanand taught me to look at the things around me as mere images. The world is an illusion, he said, and so our fear and doubt are illusions also. One has to detach oneself from these illusions in order to become free. He taught me how to view the frightening and powerful images of my foreboding almost like how a filmographer would watch a movie: with an understanding and empathy for it's contents without becoming lost in them. There is a process here that I can't quite understand or grasp, but it has helped me to stop letting my forebodes drive me nearly insane with their potency. It is very difficult. It is like drowning and remembering to deploy your life jacket, if deploying your life jacket involved a long, precise and steady process that when interrupted involved starting from the beginning. But it is worth it. Because you don't drown and then you can save the other people floundering in the water.

I only hope I can teach Kate how to use her own life jacket. It is going to be hard. There are so many layers to the hurt that she has suffered. The overdose is only the physical part and that in itself, from what I've witnessed, is going to be like a living purgatory. But then there are the emotional strains. I've never quite figured out what Kate and Kyle's relationship or relationships have been. I'm much too polite to ask. But it is clear they care a great deal about each other. And, looking back, I think the tether I witnessed from her when I was training had to do with her fighting with Kyle about his pigment use. And now she has suffered for his addiction. There's a part of me that sympathizes with what he must be going through right now. There's another part of me that wants to punch him in the face, but I've mostly calmed down from that more primal reaction. That being said, I have no idea how Kate is going to react. I have no idea how she is going to react to any of this. I have no idea how she is going to react to me being here. But there is one thing I do know: however she reacts, whatever she is going through, I am not going to let her go through it alone. I may have been thoroughly plastered when I said it, but i told her i meant to make her last days here count. I am not going to let her waste the rest of her possibly short life in the hospital or having a breakdown or dealing with emotional crap. She is going to work, and have fun and have a life. Even if I have to move the seven levels of Hell to do it.

Greetings from India.

Well, I haven't written in this thing for a while. Life's been a little hectic to say the least. I REALLY don't feel like going into it, but you're my diary and no one reads this but me right? And I remember what happened. I don't think I will ever forget.


So here I am in India with Julie on our Magical Mystery Tour. We spent the first day just sightseeing which made Julie all sorts of happy. I'm a little worried about having enough luggage to bring back all the silks and brass and spices she's bought. I really shouldn't be letting her run around with so much money but she's so happy and i can't bring myself to stop her and I keep just buying everything for her whenever she gives me the puppy dog look. I'm such a sucker. But hey, I'm making more money now then I know what to do with so why the heck not?

The second day we did some poking around. It took a while for people to realize we aren't just stupid white tourists but eventually after a long and meaningful discussion about the difference between Eastern and Western approaches to meditation I got someone who seems to know the mystic community to talk to me. Julie and I managed to narrow down a few mystics who seem to know something about astral projection. Now we just need to see if we can find someone who knows about actual out of body experiences like we do at Orpheus and then we need to find someone who can help me with my Foreboding. It's a gamble, but it's what i'm here for, and I'm determined to succeed.

Other then that, it's been kind of nice to get away though I miss people and I have a heck of a lot of unfinished business to deal with when I get back. I smuggled some of Elena's Bubby's sleeping potion into the country with me so at least I've been sleeping. That stuff is amazing. I need to get the recipe from her.

I miss Elena, believe it or not, and I'm worried about her. I hope she's coping okay with things at work and all the tension that must be going around. I feel like a bit of a heel to be abandoning everyone like this, but Julie is right. I need to take care of myself or I won't be able to take care of others. And it's not just me who needs to learn to control my Foreboding, it's Kate too and any other banshee after us. And if it takes me going half way around the world to make Kate's last year on Earth a good one then I will.

Like I said: sucker.

Anyways, I also have the sword of Damocles of Murphy hanging over my head. On the one hand I get why he's pissed at me. I mean, I'm pissed at me. But after all we've been through, I make one fuck-up and suddenly he can't trust me. I save his life, help him move his ex on, help him get information out of Grace, be there for him, help him investigate Valentine and yet, I have one night of being drunk and tired and letting my emotions get the better of me in a bad way and suddenly I'm not to be trusted. That really burns. I feel like for the last year I've done nothing but run around trying to prove myself to him but it's never good enough. He's been on my case since day one, and I finally felt like I was getting somewhere with him but...

Well, I guess I let him down.I mean, I'm Mr. Sweater-vest right? Champion of women. I'm the one who almost beat up Morgan for even looking at Elena, and yet I just turn around and take advantage of my boss when her guard was down. That must be what he's thinking. Man, that really makes me seem like an asshole huhn?

I guess pointing out that I love her is just kind of justification.

Well, Julie is awake and bugging me to go check out that restaurant we passed yesterday. The woman calls and I must obey.

Sucker.

Kate.

Sometimes she pisses me off so much.

I do realize that a lot of this has to do with me pissing myself off. I didn't do an undergraduate in psychology for nothing. I realize that one of the reasons I want to help Kate so much is because I want to believe that when I become like that in a year or so I can be helped. But that's not all of it. There's my natural tendency to want to help everyone and of course my white knight syndrome. But its also that she tries so hard to help everyone else, and it's just unfair and stupid that she should take all the burden on herself and not share it at all. I just want to take some of that burden off of her. Remind her that she is a real live woman who can have a life outside of Orpheus and who shouldn't have to carry the weight of the entire company's emotionally well-being on her shoulders. I want to help! Even if it's just by letting her talk about it to someone else. But she wont let me.

Sometimes I think she does it on purpose. I think she has a martyr syndrome. She only feels worthwhile if she is miserable for the sake of others.

And on top of that she keeps Foreboding. When she knows I can do it, and often do it without meaning to.

I just wish she would share the burden.

Is that totally unreasonable?

On Death.

Today I stood by as members of my office destroyed a soul. It made me wonder about the nature of the soul and death.

Kabbalistically speaking there are four layers to the soul: The Chiah or the Divine Spark, the Neshama or the Higher Self, the Ruach or the Intellect and the Nephesh or the Animal Soul. According to Kabbalistic thought, when we die, the Chiah is automatically reunited with the Divine, whereas the Neshama may also reunite or be reincarnated. Sometimes the Ruach and the Nephesh get left behind, and this is what Kabbalists refer to as ghosts or "shells."

So, if this is true, and it certainly make sense with my experience at Orpheus, then the ghosts we work with may have the intellectual personalities (in some of the higher functioning classes) and the basic desires of the people they were once part of, but they are not the person in whole.

What happens when we send on a ghost or destroy it? Is there really a difference? Do the ghosts we send on reunite with their higher aspects or just get absorbed into the life-force energy of the divine like the Chiah does? If we destroy it, does that destroy some of that divine energy or just disperse it to become another type of energy? How does this affect reincarnation if such a thing exists?

And more importantly: is destroying a ghost the same as destroying a life?

Was I just an accessory to murder, however well deserved it might have been? Do we at Orpheus have the right to make the decisions as to whose souls are to be sent on and whose are to be destroyed?

And if we don't, then who does?

Ow.

I tried to punch the competition today.


Ow.

That was dumb.

Interpersonal Relationships.

Everyone in this company is so damaged. I mean I'm one to talk but still. You have Elena who has the self esteem of a scared mouse, despite the fact that she is literally a computer genius; you have Murphy who puts on this mask of asshole to cover up the fact that he is complete emotionally destroyed which is covering up the fact that he is in fact exceptionally strong-willed (I know, three layers. Like a cake. Or a really small onion like a shallot); You have Rizotto who uses anger to cover up confusion; you have Westing who uses drugs to.... no he just uses drugs and then you have Kate who runs herself into the ground trying to take care of everyone's crazy without realizing that that is her crazy.

I mean really.

Personally, I think Murphy is the most fucked up but I'm suspecting he has some real damage there that may hopefully one day be healed. I just worry about how he might be pushing his issues on Faith, or at least using Faith to work out his own issues and I worry for how that will effect both of them if it goes wrong. Then again it might go right and then they will both be better for it. We'll see.

Kate.... Kate needs a vacation. And someone to talk to, but she won't talk to me because she knows how it effects me and doesn't want to put me through that. I know how she feels. We've started a pretty good game of Go though. I suspect she will kick my ass.

At least with Elena I can have some sort of effect. All she needs is some encouragement and recognition I think. Or at least that's as good a start as any.

Don't even get me started on Rizotto. I don't even want to open that can of worms. I have a feeling the can is bigger then I can handle.

Meanwhile, I have these stupid images eating away at my brain. I need to learn to meditate better. Fast.

Blue Elephant.

Don't think of the blue elephant.

How do you not think about the blue elephant?

Mediating helps, mostly, but I can't meditate all fucking day.

It's not fading away. I never realized before what a defense mechanism poor memory is. I would give anything to misremember this, to have it be unclear or fuzzy. I don't want to remember in clear detail the feel of the shadow looming over me, the look of fear on Elena's face, the dust clinging to the street sign, the determination in Blink's eyes. I don't want to remember the look of the blood on Lucy's stomach, the hint of ghostly intestines peeking through her pale image. I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want to.

Leave me alone.

I'm so tired.

So god-damn tired.

I want to sleep, but whenever I do I remember it. I remember the specter, and worse, I remember the feeling of the specter. The wrongness, the howling horror of it, the terrifying twisted humanity. I could be that one day. We could all be that one day. How could we be that one day?

Oh God.

I want it to stop. I want it to go away. But it never will. Never.

Don't think of the blue elephant.

You can't, can you?

People politics.

Well today I met some other new trainees. It was a little confusing at first because Kate had told me to meet her outside the classroom so I wasn't sure if I was actually supposed to be in the training with the others. I'm not sure I helped my reputation much. It seems I've received a little more training then the others and the guy who took over the class until Kate could get there called me "the new pet." Oh well. If you are going to be the pet, I suppose it's best to be the VP's pet right?

Julie laughed at me when I told her about how I'd been awkward and stuttered and generally felt like I made an ass out of myself. And in typical Julie fashion she finished making fun of me and then said: "Don't worry Dave, you're a great guy. People will come to figure that out eventually, even if you're a bit of an ass sometimes." And then she said "And maybe you'll meet a nice girl!" I swear. Sometimes she's worse then my mother.

I have, unfortunately, added to my list of people I definitely don't like. There's this smarmy guy, Morgan. I came across him the other day making the secretary (sweet woman) uncomfortable. And then, as if that hadn't been enough to make my inner caveman grumpy, during lunch at the training day he starts hitting on one of the poor girls from training. This girl, Elena I think her name is, obviously did not want attention. I mean all he had to do was look at the way she dresses. She's obviously quite lovely and really, the baggy clothes don't do much to hide it, but it's just as obvious that she wears the baggy clothes in an attempt to. And it's not in the way I'm used to where the girls feel like they can't get dressed up nicely because people will judge them as superficial and bad scientists or because they really don't care. There is something very deliberate about the way this girl tries to hide every curve of her body. She probably got teased or something. Kids can be shits. Anyways, the point is, it was obvious to anyone with eyeballs that she wants to be left alone but here comes Captain Smarmy Pants trying to chat her up. It just made my blood boil. And the worst part was he was being so subtle about it. The worst predators are the once you can't see until they pounce, and this guy practically SCREAMS predator. It makes me ill. So anyways, with the help of Liam, one of the other trainees, we managed to run interference. I was maybe a bit too subtle and Morgan wasn't too daunted but he got the picture when Liam bumped into him totally by "mistake." I like that guy. He's interesting. I think I annoy him a bit, but I appreciate anyone who can perceive a situation like that and take action. Also he helped me subdue Captain Smarmy Pants for now anyways which gives him a gold star in my book. He also seems to be very perceptive when it comes to ghosts. He was the only one who felt my presence when I was doing the shade test for Kate.

Speaking of, one of the other trainees is also a wisp. Dear G-d do I hope she's a less artificial Bitchy Boots then Ilona. She seems a nice enough girl from what I've seen. A little eclectic in hair color but I suppose that's part of her wisp thing. Callie, I think is her name. Anyways, now I have a pink-festooned Glinda in my head going "Are you a good wisp or a bad wisp?"

I think I watch too many movies...

Training Days.

I am starting to get the distinct feeling that in a company of strange people I am considered even stranger. This shocked me a little, though I suppose it makes sense. Everyone deals with the unexpected differently and trying to explain it with science, in this day and age, is not uncommon. And really, I am one to talk. My degree is in parapsychology, not in theology, so I too run on the theory that there is a scientific explanation for these things, or at least that science can measure them. On the other hand, why dispense with the old just to embrace the new? Mystics have used rituals to safeguard themselves from spirits and to achieve spiritual powers for centuries. If it's not broke, then why fix it?

I am not about to abandon the practices I have been relying on and that have been keeping me safe since my near death experience but that doesn't change the fact that when I talk about or do a kabbalistic ritual everyone here looks at me funny. I suppose, as Julie has sometimes opined, I should learn when to shut the fuck up and keep my ideas and opinions to myself. The problem is that this is how I have learned and how I see things and make sense of them. Also it's just all so interesting! It's frustrating that I can't talk about my theories with anyone, but then I suppose that's what this diary is for.

This is my first week of training here at Orpheus, and despite some troubles trying to fit in with my co-workers I think things are going well. I managed to go through most of the basic training quite easily once I grasped the concept. Of course my trainer, Ms. Darewell, thinks I'm crazy because of my "humming" but it gets the job done. Learning to project and manifest at the different levels was quite fun actually and I'm excited to start some more intensive training. Of course, the meditations required were almost laughable they was so easy but I won't tell Darewell that. I don't think she likes me as it is.

More interesting by far was the training on the different forms of ghosts and shades that I learned from Kate Dennison (so far the only member of this company I really like and the only one, I think, who doesn't think I'm a little batty). Particularly interesting to me are Mystery Group #1 and #2 (I know: such fantastically imaginative names. Sigh.) The former being people who can sort of create realms and things in the astral (I think) and the latter being violent and unstable ghosts. This last is quite interesting because it has sparked a theory.

Traditionally the term Qlippoth (shells) is the word used in Kabbalistic theory to denote impure beings: beings that obscure or hide their divine sparks, similar to the Christian concept of Demons, or even the Buddhist one. However Israel Regardie also refers to Qlippoth as the "the shells of the dead." I always thought this made sense considering the Kabbalistic idea of ghosts is that it is only one part of the soul, generally the guf, that remains bound to the lower astral realms. Thus, the remaining souls can be seen as "shells" of the former person: they are just one layer, like an Easter egg that has been emptied of it's yolk. Interestingly enough, the classes of ghosts as viewed by Orpheus seem to bear quite a bit of resemblance to how one would imagine a ghost with varying layers of its souls intact. For example a "blip class or drone class" could be seen as just a guf, an "echo class" could be seen as having a ruach etc. But I digress. My point is, if a Qlippoth is a being that obscures or hides it's chiah (or Higher Soul), then perhaps a ghost who has lost it's chia could also become a Qlippoth. This may explain the mystery class #2.

It is certainly worth investigating.