How I Met the Buddha

I want to start off by saying this is completely our of order chronologically, I just wanted to put it out there because there seems to be so much darkness in the world and I hope that this little story will maybe let some light in. That is really what this story is about, letting the light in and it has been on my mind because its August and I always think about my journey in August, the reasons for it will become clear. So let us begin at the beginning.

Many years ago I had a friend that had a baby boy, I ended up playing quite a large roll in his life and subsequently he in mine. When he was three me and his mother decided I should adopt him so that I could officially act as a parent. We did this and that changed my world view quite radically. I decided at that point that all the anger, hatred and resentment that I carried around didn't need to be passed on to him, that it wasn't his and he deserved better. So I started to explore Buddhism because it seemed to me to talk a lot about loosing ones anger. For this and several other reasons I called my adopted son my Buddha.

This exploration began by reading a book entitled "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" by Sogyal Rinpoche. In this book he outlines a meditation to develop more compassion in your life. I began to practice this meditation and the transformation began. In those days I wouldn't call it dramatic, but it was a start. I would say I hated less.

Now lets fast forward a couple of years, the boy is now 5 almost 6 and as a result of many circumstances I was put in the position of having to fight to see him. I was torn up inside to say the very least. I was so full of rage feeling the victim and wanting to really hurt those responsible. As I was raging about town, I had people give me postcards telling of the Dalai  Lama's Visit to Atlanta. At one point I was in a store and a hippie walked in handed me the postcard and walked out never giving one to my friends, just me. At this point one of my friends said "well, I guess your going to see the Dalai Lama" I shrugged and said "I guess I am".

The day came to go see His Holiness and it was pouring down rain. I was all in black, looking like an angry black rat. The rage that poured out of me was obvious, I seen pictures of the event in the paper later and you could tell where I was because in this sea of people there was this black speck, with no one around it, that was me. Eventually a friend of mine did show up so I didn't feel so alone. 

Then he walked out on stage and greeted the crowd. Everyone stood up and laughed for no reason, and I found myself doing the same, His joy was infectious, then he stopped and put his hands together like in this photo and looked right at me. At first I thought he was looking at the photographer in front of me, but then he seemed to look over him and right at me. I mean, he was still quite far away, and he may not have been even able to see me, but I felt something very powerful just then. 

Then he started to speak and he talked about how the most important thing a parent can do is teach their children compassion. I openly wept at that, he had shown me what I was doing, he had disarmed me in one sentence. I realized that I was putting out all this hate and forgetting the most important thing. This was all about a child, he needed love and compassion, not a war. So I decided that from that point on I would put him first and not do things just to win or hurt the people that had hurt me.

This is when the story of me and the Buddha starts to get weird. I get on the train to go back home and on walks a couple of monks with an interpreter. They were talking among themselves and then the interpreter asked me what I thought of H.H. The Dalai Lama, and I said I couldn't answer him because I would cry. He only smiled and nodded as though he completely understood. Then he told this to the monk and the monk said something back. The translator then said in a British accent that if I had any questions that this monk was Khalkha Jetsun Dhampa the head of the Mongolian monastery. I wasn't as impressed then as I should have been, but I was still very impressed.

After a bit of a ride and soaking in the really good vibes the English chap asked me how to get to a certain place via the train and I told him that I could show them because I was going basically in the same direction and that navigating could be tricky because you had to switch trains at a certain spot. So they agreed and I led these revered monks to there destination safely. Once we arrived Khalkha Jetsun Dhampa asked through the interpreter if I had brought a camera, oddly enough this was before the Photo-Monk Project so I didn't have one with me. So I answered that I came only with an open heart, to which he responded by grabbing my hands and bumping heads with me, a form of blessing. I of course cried the entire time home.

A couple of weeks later this kid walks into the shop that I work and remembers me from that day, he tells me that he was also on the train with the monks. I remember him and we talked, I told him the above story and he leaves. Then the next day I'm standing out side and that same kid walks up to me and hugs me. He says that he had been thinking about out conversation all night and he just had to come back and thank me and hug me. Again I found myself crying.

That situation with my Little Buddha would straighten out and he was again a regular part of my life, but I had changed a great deal, I would begin to really explore Buddhism over the next several years and continued to open my heart and develop a stronger sense of compassion. It was easy to do with my boy around. He was a constant source of compassion for me. Then it would happen again, this time he was taken away for good, and I was going to have to enter into the court system to even have access to him. Instead of instantly going to rage, I looked at what was best for him and was patient. In fact I was just going to let it all work itself out until his court appointed lawyer came to see me and asked me to fight for custody, she almost begged me. I of course agreed, I told her I didn't even think I could fight for custody. She said I could and I should, she was actually quite wrong about that and it was a devastating blow. Because I fought for custody his grandmother vowed to never let me see him again. She has so far kept her vow. This is why I think about this kind of thing in August, he will be 14 the 29th of August.

I knew then I had to make a decision. I had to decided if I wanted to go back to the person I was before he entered my life, or if I wanted to find a way to apply all the compassion I had generated for him to the rest of the world. Of course I knew it would be easier to just shut down and go back to how I was. I also knew I really didn't want to do that so I decided I would try to open up to the world. So I started to study more seriously Buddhist texts and even received a couple of Tibetan Buddhist empowerments that are like direct transmissions of the Dharma from a teacher to a student.

My first was a Medicine Buddha empowerment, my thought was that it would go well with my Reiki practice. It is such a compassion based empowerment that I really think I needed it to keep my heart open. To this day I do Medicine Buddha practice a couple times a week.

The second empowerment I received was Vajrasattva, who is known as the Buddha of emptiness. This seemed to be perfect for me at the time, I had so much old stuff that needed to go so that I could even begin to understand where this whole crazy journey was taking me.

Around this time I was getting heavily tattooed and was using the tattoo sessions to chant and practice meditation. As a result I was having some real spiritual experiences. Now all this being said, I don't want to

lead anyone to think that I was able to just go from great loss to great compassion. I was a mess for quite some time as a result of having the one person that I loved absolutely ripped from my life. I was however working very hard at my spiritual life, most likely because of the amount of emotional pain that I was experiencing. It was during this time that I had my next big break through. 

I was getting a reclining Buddha tattooed on my arm by my friend Bekki. I was thinking about the historical Buddha's life, because the reclining Buddha represents when the Buddha passed on. As I was thinking about the life of the Buddha, I began to think about how he left his wife and son to go off and seek enlightenment. That part had never made since to me. At this stage it made even less since to me because I would do anything to be with my boy. I couldn't imagine leaving him on purpose. Then it all hit me, as the tattoo machine hummed, my thoughts raced. I finely understood that Buddha had left because he knew he had no answers to give his son. That his son would get sick, grow old and die and he could offer him no peace, no answers to why. So he went off to find those answers and after obtaining enlightenment returned to ordain his son. I understood his love was so unselfish, so pure and so necessary to drive his search for enlightenment. This made me realize that I had to use my situation as the same, even though I did not choose it, I could use it as a motivation so that when and if I ever see him again I could offer him compassion and not anger, regret, jealousy and so on. I would seek enlightenment like the Buddha for the same reasons the Buddha did, to give those that I love a way out. After that my pursuit of enlightenment became my obsession and so I became quite an accidental Buddhist at that point. Stumbling into one awakening after another. 

My next strange shift in consciousness happened one night after teaching a class. One of the students asked me if I could have anything in the world what it would be and I said "I want to see what Buddha seen". With that idea clear in my mind I set out to go home and began contemplating Hotei or the fat Buddha you see depicted in Chinese culture. He has a lot of stories and myths surrounding him but I was thinking about one in particular, in which he was a monk who obtained enlightenment after dropping his laundry bag or letting go of his burdens. On contemplating this I asked myself what my burdens where and if I really thought that we could really be enlightened in a single moment like that.

Then I seen this light out of the corner of my eye, it was coming from this man that was walking up the stairs, he was using crutches and so I thought that for some reason his aura was extra bright or something because of his condition. Then someone else came on the ramp and I could see the same kind of light coming from them. It looked like a miniature universe spiraling out of their chest! Then I realized I was seeing their Buddha nature. I could feel it tugging on mine, then I realized it was all the same like a stream gathering in puddles along the way and we where the puddles. I fully expected that experience to be gone when I woke up the next morning, chalking it up to exhaustion or a heightened state of awareness from my long period of meditation the previous day. It was still there however the next day and the next and the next for quite some time. I would look at people and see this universe spiraling out of there chest.Having no idea what the hell was going on I continued my meditation and study.

My next experience was a big one, I was standing in front of the shop that I was working in thinking about the Buddha's teachings. I was thinking about how he said that all life was suffering and yet in Nirvana there was no suffering but Nirvana and Samsara (cyclic existence) where the same. I am paraphrasing of course. 

As I thought about this my mind started to really pick apart the nature of suffering, going deeper and deeper. I finally reached this point that I knew that if I continued contemplating this I would die. I mean I really felt like I would die if I continued. So of course I continued and at that moment I decided that I would be willing to die to understand, I heard this sound in my head that sounded like breaking glass and I was everywhere spreading out in every direction. I understood everything and I didn't exist. I wrote this email to some of my friends shortly after to just document it a little. I was quite insane when I wrote it, but in a really good way:

"Hello all,

I am writing this email to try to quantify an enlightened experience.  Not only am I trying to document the events, but also I have a deep need to pass on what in site this mind gained as a result.  It is my further hope that some of you may be in a place were this experience may benefit you in your own path toward enlightenment.  Nothing that is about to be said is new.  The only importance that it has here is that these experiences and in sites were gained using this mind and this body.

Upon contemplating one of the Buddha's teachings, the slow dismantlement of self began.  I was thinking about the nature of suffering and how the Buddha related that in Nirvana there was no suffering, however he also said that he realized that most beings in the world were experiencing suffering.  He also taught that all existence ended in suffering.  I was trying to make since out of what seemed like two very contradictory thoughts.  At that point I began to trace back the source of suffering.  This happened so fast that I cannot even relate what stages took place.

The next few stages seemed to happen all at once as my mind began to give in to the Buddha mind.  I realized that all suffering stemmed from the idea of "self", that without the 'self there would be no experience of suffering".  Then I began to think about what the self was.  It was at this point that all began to break apart. Realizing that the 'self' was nothing more than the stored data collected from the apparatus known as the body.  This was followed by the realization that when this body dies all that I held as me would be gone.  The true nature of the self was no were to be found within the body or brain.  These are old truths, the experience of them however was very different than the intellectual understanding of them.

What happened next is the topic of this email.  My mind was gone, this body and this mind were no longer associated with my existence.  The Buddha nature was in this body and in this mind.  The universe at that point was much different. There was a since of sameness that I can only describe as true reality.  I spent much time trying to figure out a way to explain it.  The best I could come up with is that if you plug in a coffee pot, it will act as a coffee pot.  If you unplug it and plug in a toaster into the same outlet it will act like a toaster.  What Buddha showed me was that this body and this mind is neither the toaster nor the coffee pot the the current itself that animates them both.  At this point the Buddha was awake and this body and this mind was free from suffering having removed the cause.

Then the realization of karma and death/rebirth were seen much like lightning striking the earth.  Desires wishing to be grounded.  Seeing karma from this perspective allowed this mind to see why this was happening now and how one mind could be responsible for several rebirths depending on how the desires grounded.

The Buddha nature was revealed to me as millions of Buddhas all the same filling space and then the mantra came to me.  I have been repeating ever since.  "I am not this body, I am not this mind, my true nature is that of a Buddha".  This simple mantra serves to remind this body and this mind of its true nature.

Much more than could be put down was awakened, this is only a brief overview of what took place over several hours one awakening after another until the Buddha nature was revealed.

One last note is how beautiful this body and mind are once the cause of suffering is removed.  All life is pure joy!! Each breath a miracle.  This life has now changed.  This body and this mind will do all that it can to share and teach.  None of us are free until all of us are free."

Now, I don't think that I am enlightened or anything, I think I was able to poke a hole in the veil that obscures my vision from ultimate reality and so I was able to catch a brief glimpse that would change my life forever. I have never been able to look at reality the same way since then. This experience lasted for about a month as I slowly returned to my normal waking consciousness. I tried to hold on to that state of consciousness, but since I am not a fully awakened Buddha, I couldn't of course. I have tried since then to understand this experience and try to develop the vocabulary to discuss it properly. It is also important of course to note that I was not under the influence of any drugs that could cause such euphoric states, it was only my mind that I was working with.

So I road that crazy train for awhile trying to put it into a proper context. Then I found a wonderful vehicle for it. It was another one of those accidental Buddhist things. A friend called me and asked me if I wanted to go to a Kalachakra ritual at the Jonang Tibetan Buddhist Temple. I didn't want to go at first because I was broke at the time, but had just watched something about it and so thought it would be something cool to photograph. I of course was thinking of the big turning of the wheel of Dharma festival and that was not at all what I was being invited to. He told me he would help me pay for it so away we went. 

When we arrived it was a small house and it was obvious by the quiet waiting that this was not going to be the festival I thought. We registered however and when the time came we went into the shrine room. At the time I only vaguely understood the significance of what was to take place. Now I totally get it and understand why it was perfect for that stage in my practice.

Upon entering there were several monks and a translator. The monk setting on the highest seat turned out to be  Lama Tashi Gyaltsan Rinpoche the actual throne holder of the Jonang linage. I mean come on really? So anyway I received a great deal of transmissions that day that would go on to unfold within me for several months to come. Everyday was like a consciousness unveiling, I wasn't sure what revelation I would wake up to. It was quite amazing. I would call my friend Bill almost everyday and be like "Okay, today I woke up and was experiencing the suffering of the God Realm, I mean I know the suffering of being wished into existence. Is that normal?" He was so wonderful, he always had an answer for me and would always assure me I wasn't crazy or if I was it was the right kind of crazy.

So as a result of that empowerment I decided I needed to strip myself clean and go on a monastic journey, to live simply and practice all that I had learned, you know walk my walk. So I left the shop I was working informed everyone I was leaving, through a big party at my house and made people take my stuff home with them.  What I didn't gve away I through away. Then I set out on my journey. 

Throughout all this I had reestablished a relationship with my brother and he sounded like he wanted to do some kind of humanitarian work with me. I was very excited about this prospect, because after my changes in consciousness I didn't want to do anything that didn't benefit other sentient beings.  So I moved to Indianapolis, Indiana to see what that was all about. This turned out to be the darkness before the Dharma storm. I ended up very alone, very detached from my community and it really messed up the relationship I had with my brother. It gave me time to think however about what was important to me and what I wanted to do. The more time I spent alone, the more sure I was that I had to help some how, I just had to help alleviate all this suffering. So I left there and the plan was back to traveling. As soon as I did, things got interesting again.

I went up to stay with my Mom for a little while before I went off traveling. Me and my cousin started going on adventures when we had the chance and on one of these we passed a large golden Buddha. Now this would not be so strange if we didn't happen to be in the middle of Amish country. So of course we had to turn around and find out what was up.

We met a monk from Laos who was there on behalf of a small group of Laos families in the area. He was so excited to sit and talk the Dharma with me. It looked as though I was back on track again. He blessed us the first time we left and we decided to give him a Buddha for his alter before I left town. The day came when me and my cousin were going to search for a Buddha for him and we are headed toward the mall and I get a text from a friend of mine in the area. He had no idea that any of this was going on, but he sent me a picture of a bright red Buddha statue he had found at an antique market. I of course told Kieth to turn around and we went to the antique store. Upon entering we asked the woman at the desk about the statue and she had no idea what we were talking about, so the search was on. We must have looked for an hour before we finely found it. It was red alright and overpriced, but we got it anyway, because what are the odds that Cory would text me that picture on the day we were looking for a statue. We took it to our monk and he was delighted.

So I soon took off making my first stop back in Atlanta just in time for the Tibetan Festival at Drepung Loseling, the Gelug monastery. The first cool thing that happened to me this time around was that one of the Venerable Monks gave me a whole pile of this spice that he had brought from India. I would call it my "monk spice". I was so happy about it because I thought of all the chants, and Dharma 

activities that spice had been exposed to and so each time I had some I felt like I was ingesting a little bit of the Dharma. The other cool thing that happened was a visit by Kyabje Locho Rinpoche  and I was able to sit in on an empowerment he did for Avalokiteshvara or the Buddha of compassion, also known as Chenrezig. So I got all filled with compassion before I jetted off to my next big destination in Hawaii.

I arrived in Hawaii with my monk spice and my new Chenrezig glow and set out to explore the Dharma further. I had decided at this point that I really liked Tibetan Buddhism specifically and so was really looking for a Dharma center like Drepung Loseling, although I really had very little knowledge of the different schools of Tibetan Buddhism, I was only an accidental Buddhist. So it was a good thing I had all that Chenrezig energy to guide me. Soon after my arrival the friend that I was staying with told me there was a Tibetan center close to the house. Close was an understatement, it was the next street over, I could have hit it with a rock if I was so inclined.  This would turn out to be Kagyu Thegchen Ling a Kagyu center founded by His Eminence Khyab Je Kalu Rinpoche a great Kagyu yogi.

So I started to go over there when I could and practicing. It was very different than what I was used to in Atlanta, all of it was done in Tibetan with little or no instruction, just jump right in. I began to get frustrated, I liked it, but I just was having a hard time connecting with it. Then something amazing happened. I decided to participate in this special practice that they would be doing for several days, I think 12 and it started the day after my birthday. So I made a commitment to myself that I would go everyday and do the entire thing. After a couple of days I walked in and the Lama that I was used to seeing wasn't there, in his place was a much older Lama who I recognized from their site as Lama Karma Rinchen. He looked at me and said, "Hello, it is so good to see you again". I said that we hadn't ever met and he insisted we had and told me to sit and pointed to the one seat in the whole center that I always sat. That kinda blew my mind, I knew we hadn't met I would have remembered this amazing man, I could feel my heart beating out of my chest when I was around him and at times I wanted to weep in his presence and I had seen others do just that. I decided that I really wanted to learn from this monk and so set out to get to know him.

One day after our practice I went home to take a shower and noticed I had what I thought was a rash on my legs, I came out of the bathroom and showed Carolyn because she is a nurse after all. She said it didn't look like a rash but like a burn. I then noticed it was the size of my hands and that my hands had actually burned my legs during my session with Lama Rinchen. This was not the only amazing thing I experienced while I was working with him. Another time I was there for a Tsok which is a kind of ritual feast and part of it involves wine, but in this case it was rice wine. Now I haven't drank for over 20 years at that point, so I was pretty sure I shouldn't do a shot of rice wine. I leaned over and asked Lama Rinchen if it was okay and he said it wouldn't hurt me at all. So for whatever reason I did it, that is completely out of character for me, I am usually very stubborn about such things. The strange thing was he was right, I felt nothing, no warm belly, no slight buzz, nothing at all! 

I would end up sitting with Lama and he would read the Dharma to me in English to practice his English, we would cook and eat together, rake leaves and most importantly he would teach me the Refuge practice and I would take my refuge vows with him. That means that he became what is known as my Refuge Lama, or my personal connection to the Dharma and a linage. Soon I had to leave my Lama, but I carry him in my heart and hope to see him again in this lifetime.

I soon went on to Colorado and was able to process and absorb all that Lama Rinchen had taught me. I was able to put it to immediate use by befriending a woman that was very ill. I got to know her and her husband quite well and would like to think that many of the gifts that my Lama gave me I was able to pass on to them. Soon it was time for me to leave there as well and back to my home town I went.

I stopped in and seen my monk from Laos, he told me I didn't look like a monk on the outside, but I was in fact a monk on the inside and that in our next life he hoped we would be monks together. It was such a beautiful thing for him to say. He had obviously seen the transformation that had taken place since I had last seen him. He also told me that we stopped by on an auspicious day because he was taking the Buddha that we gave him to a meeting of several monks and they were going to bless it. I was so happy.

Soon I would head back to Atlanta after two years of rambling around. I arrived just in time for the Tibetan Festival again and a Medicine Buddha Mandala that the monks were constructing. So of course I went to be a part of that mess. Upon leaving the closing ceremony for the Medicine Buddha Mandala I went to thank one of the monks for, well all that monks do, and he grabbed my hands and pulled me real close to him. He asked my name and I told him and he told me his and then just looked me deep in the eyes. I'm not sure what was going on but it was intense. After it was over one of my friends said "What was that all about?" to which

Bill answered "That's Caleb for ya" with a shrug and a smile. So I felt like I had a place to continue practicing and decided to try to attend Drepung as much as I could. Soon after that they had a visit by H.E. Gaden Tripa Rizong Rinpoche in the position of Gaden Tripa, the holder of the throne of Je Tsongkhapa, and the supreme head of the Gelug Linage of Tibetan Buddhism. So in other words a really big deal and he was going to do an Chenrezig Empowerment. So you know I had to do that and so completed my full cycle of Chenrezig. Oh, I forgot to mention that Lama Rinchen in Hawaii considered Chenrizig his primary practice, so no wonder I felt such compassion and open hardheartedness around him. 

After my second Chenrezig empowerment I got back on a very disciplined daily practice enhancing it by going to Drepung as much as I could get there. After a couple of weeks of this I was surprised by an announcement that Drepung was welcoming a new teacher. They asked us to welcome Gala Rinpoche and as soon as he walked out, I felt that same heart leaping out of my chest feeling that I felt with Lama Rinchen. It was different of course, but still it was a heart pull for sure. However he is a Tulku and I didn't think it would be possible for me to actually sit with him the way I did Lama Rinchen. A Tulku is someone that is recognized as the reincarnation of a great teacher and in Tibetan Culture they are highly respected. So I thought he would have everyone crowding around him and I wouldn't even get to say hello. This isn't how it worked out however and I have my old friend Chenrezig to thank.

The monks were in town and they where doing a Chenrezig Mandala, so of course I had to go see that!  I went on a Tuesday to see the monks make the mandala and then went to Drepung for Medicine Buddha practice. Gala Rinpoche walked up and greeted us as he often did and asked how we were. I said I was great and had just come from the mandala and he said he loved the clicking sound of their tools. I said that it reminded me of the clicking of mala beads rubbing together, at which point he snatched my mala out of my hand and began to rub them together. He then smiled and handed them back to me, at that moment for whatever reason I knew I had to learn from him, but still didn't think I had a chance. 

I did my Medicine Buddha practice and stayed for the Tuesday talk and after it went up to Gala Rinpoche and started to ask him about a practice that I wanted to study with Lama Rinchen but was unable to. He said to my surprise that he would teach me! Since that time I do get a chance when he is free to sit with him and learn. I feel such a great joy and excitement from him, he inspires me to work once again toward enlightenment and to help, always to help.

So this brings me to where I am now with this Buddha Nature that I am trying to awaken. I meet with Gala Rinpoche when I can, I am trying to bring Lama Rinchen here to teach for maybe a week next year and I get to hear Geshe Ngawang Phende talk often. What an amazing teacher Geshe Phende is! His Tuesday talks have caused bombs to go off in my head in a very very good way. I would love to get to know him better, but I am intimidated by him because I am such a reckless accidental Buddhist. At least these days I do at least call myself a Buddhist. 

So that is my story with the Buddha so far. I wanted to tell it now not to convert anyone to this crazy stuff, or to preach at all. I present it to just say that there is still some real light in this world. I know it seems so dark at times, but I'm telling you, if I can go from being a person filled with so much hate to a being that really wants to help anything is possible. Then there are these people, these warriors of light with smiles that slice through our pretense and arrogance. Not just Buddhist warriors either, I mean there are people like this everywhere, I just seem to stumble into the Buddhist ones. So don't give up home my roses, this garden has so much room to bloom.

I am so very grateful that I have been in the presents of such amazing people, the only explanation that I can come up with is that I was a mangy old dog that hung out at a temple in my last life. In this life the monks are just happy I can actually practice the Dharma on my own that they want to help me. I am so humbled and honored that they do.

May all beings have happiness and the cause of happiness.

May they be free of suffering and the cause of suffering.

May they never be disassociated from the supreme happiness which is without suffering.

May they remain in the boundless equanimity, free from both attachment to close ones and rejection of others.

Peace.

Karma Tsultrim Tharchen 

(Caleb Storms)

IX: The Rebirth

On that couch I began to put my life together again and try to gain some perspective on my new life.  I started to go to therapy for the first time, actually went on antidepressants for a short period as I began to look at things such as my sister’s death, my sexuality and my endless search for God.  All of those topics were hard for me to discuss in this little rust belt of a town after what I had been through.

My coming out was not all that easy.  I had built what I thought was a solid support network within various 12 step programs, and when I came out I expected that support to carry through.  It did not however, I spent many nights sitting in the dark crying.  Perhaps that is why it was so easy for me to take on the persona of the tragic dark figure.  That is indeed how I felt inside.  

When I came out I was asked not to discuss it in meetings because it didn’t have anything to do with staying sober/clean.  I would argue that I used over those issues countless times.  So suddenly I felt like an outcast among the very people that I felt so welcomed by.  Some of these people I considered very close.  It hurt me quite deeply.  So much of my time on the couch and in therapy was spent letting go of that shame and finding my strength. 

I am not sure what would have become of me if I wouldn’t have had that support.  These people took me in, loved me, supported me and held my hand through one of the most difficult times in my life.  It is because of their love that I am here to write any of this.  I truly do owe them my life.

As a result of trying to piece my life back together I took a job doing “psychic readings” at a gay owned and operated bookstore called  “Mindreaders”.  The girl that ran it sat with me for six hours one day talking about all things spiritual.  We seemed to have an instant connection.  It was a good environment to be in at that time.  I was surrounded by gay literature and art doing what I was good at.

It was also the first time I got to spread my Reiki wings having been recently trained in Reiki.  That in and of itself is a story worth mentioning.  One of my dear friends had come back from out west and was all excited about Reiki.  I had never heard of it, and by what he described it sounded like a million other healing techniques that I had ran across.  I decided to take one of his classes however, more to support him than for any other reason. 

I was in for quite a shock after the attunement, I suddenly began running a fever, with cold sweats and all.  I was unable to finish the course and spent the next week in bed running a high fever.  This was what I needed to be convinced Reiki was something different than the forms of healing I had previously learned.  Since that day Reiki has been an active part of my life.  

So anyway, there I was working as a psychic in a gay bookstore, with a gay club next door, along with a cafe upstairs.  It was just what I needed to regain myself and complete the rebirth that had started to take place.  I was no longer surrounded by people that judged me, I was surrounded by people that supported me in this new phase of my life.

Things suddenly evolved one day when I arrived to do my psychic stuff and Ginger, who ran the shop called me and said she wouldn’t be coming in and asked if I would open the store and look after things.  I was a bit in shock, since, I was just the psychic.  What I didn’t know was that she had been looking for a way to get out of the shop and I became that way.

The day turned into to a week and on.  The owner came in and said “So you're running the place now?” to which I answered, “Well, I guess so is that okay?”.  He kind of shrugged and smiled.  We would later have a pretty good working relationship even though there was a lot of ugliness and drama that would take place around us.

Things continued like this for some time until Ginger decided to make the final jump and leave for good.  The owner let me run things for quite some time, I even began to stay at a motel that he owned during the week so I wouldn’t have to come in from my couch in Michigan every day.  These were some fun times for me, I was young gay and pretty.  I was most definitely having fun with it.

This all being said, I wasn’t any less dark during this time.  When I came out I didn’t become rainbow bright.  I just wore more makeup and pretty clothes.  I turned into a seductive little goth kid.  This kind of made me a freak among freaks and that made me a target of both interest and scandal.  I heard some pretty crazy rumors about myself from that time.  None of them are worth mentioning, they just served to further my dark tragic persona.  I didn’t mind actually, I may have even used it to keep people at a distance.

Soon the owner came to me and said he was going to shut the store down, he had opened it after all for Ginger and because she was no longer there, he was done with it.  I convinced him to let me take it over.  We decided on a payment plan and I took over the business.  I had no idea what I was doing, but I loved being there and the life I was living so I was willing to go for it.

From that point on the store consumed me, I was there for 12 hours a day, crashing at the motel night after night.  The store started to become a hangout place for people.  A hub of conversation and safety for people.  I even began to take on a occult students.  I was building a community around myself.  This became more so when the owner bought a huge building in the same complex and moved his bar/cafe and everything to it.  I moved with him and intentionally created a sitting area with couch and tables for people to come in and sit.  I wanted to create a safe place for people to come and discuss magick, spirituality, sexuality and the like.

That part of the business worked, the rest however did not.  I was loosing my ass, but kept plugging away waiting for a miracle.  By this point I had moved in with a goth couple that I had met in the store.  They were also helping me run the store in exchange I was paying our rent.  This way I was able to at least break away from time to time and just get out.  I was such a romantic in those days, thinking that I would meet mister right.  So much so that I most likely passed him up in my own arrogance.  I had some pretty amazing people want to go out with me.  I just wasn’t interested in anything that wasn’t young and pretty, but young and pretty meant drama, drama, drama.  I even dated a married man for a bit during that time.  I liked the fact that I could send him home if he annoyed me.  I was a shallow, tragically dark little ass hole no question. 

My practice continued as usual.  I actually had a working  altar in the shop and would invoke in morning, every morning.  So this was also a time of great magickal power for me.  I think that is why the place was such a gathering place, there was a lot of awesome energy being flung around.   The place most definitely had a vibe.

Things got harder and harder on the business end of things and so I brought in an accountant and business planner.  We all sat down and went over the books trying to figure out how to save the store.  They both basically said I would be better off calling it quits.  The sadder thing was they discovered that there seemed to be a great deal of money continually missing.  I didn’t want to jump to conclusions so I started to ask some of the people that would hang out if they had noticed anyone dipping into the register. 

I was consistently given the same answer, they had all seen my roommates buy meals for a store full of people, dip in for this and that.  Basically they had been treating it like an ATM.  I was so hurt and angry.  When I confronted them, the whole thing blew up, and ended with the police being called and us never speaking in person again.  

After closing my store and losing two people that I truly loved, I fell back into a dark deep depression.  I would sleep in a closet within a room that was painted black.  No space was dark enough, I was only awake at night and spent most of my time in a dazed depressed state.   I am not sure how long this lasted, I can tell you that I am so surprised I did not hurt myself or someone else in those days.  I had a habit of waving a gun around, and had one with me always.  Life meant nothing to me, not mine and not anyone else.  I was still convinced that it was all nothing in the end and life was just one big lie.  

It was November and I went to Thanksgiving dinner at my Grandmother’s house on my dad’s side and she said that I should move south because they were planning to move to Alabama.  So I thought about it all night and decided I would do just that.  My friend that I had stayed with in Indiana when I first came back had moved to Georgia and gotten married.  I had visited her once and loved it there.  That is what I would do then, I would go south.

I convinced another friend of mine to go with me.  So we packed whatever we could fit in her car, borrowed some money from a professor friend of mine and headed south.

XIII: The Little Prince (Of Darkness)

While I was living in the big house with the Lesbian, I took on a summer job at a local college radio station as a weekend announcer.  It was just enough for me to pay for my room and have roaming money.  When I say roaming I mean just that.  I would sleep most of the day and then get all prettied up and roam the streets at night.  I must have looked like quite a freak roaming the streets in my black trench, black hair and Siouxsie wannabe makeup on.  It is amazing that I never ran into trouble roaming the streets the way I did. South Bend, has become quite a rough town since then.

Many people were concerned about me during this time.  I showed all the symptoms of being clinically depressed.  I was just tragically goth, lost in a very difficult breakup and an even more difficult process of reinventing myself. I decided that I needed a new identity, a new energy.  I needed to become a completely different person.  So I set out to do just that.  I no longer felt like the person I was on any level.  I have only undergone those kind of extreme changes a couple of times in my life.  It was like I had suddenly remembered who I was.  My memory has gotten clearer as my life has gone on.

I spent the better part of that year dating, practicing the Black Sun System, roaming the streets and filling out paperwork to legally change my name.  You would be surprised how much paperwork is involved in all that.  Now it would most likely be impossible, this was before 9/11 after all.

Thankfully I had a dear friend that was paralegal and she helped me with all that paperwork.  This was also before everyone had a computer, I certainly didn’t have one, so I had to do all that paperwork on a typewriter and if anyone is familiar with the court system, they are unforgiving.  Everything has to be perfect.

Finally I had everything ready, had done all the prerequisites and was ready to go before the judge.  I was obviously very nervous as I waited for my turn. The woman before me was turned down for a name change and all she wanted was to change her name back to her maiden name.  The judge kinda gruffly told her she should have done that during the divorce and denied her.  I was thinking that I didn’t stand a chance, I mean I was asking to change my entire name!

Up until this moment my dealings with judges hadn’t been all that great.  I’ll go into that story a little later. As I'm standing there oozing Black Sunniness he asks me to approach the bench and asks if I had fulfilled all the requirements. I told him I had.  Then he very candidly asked me why I wanted to change my name.  I said that I had been off of drugs for several years and that I didn’t want my past to interfere in the life I was trying to build.  He asked me if I was trying to avoid any debt, to which I responded no.  He then amazingly said “Granted”.  At that moment I legally became Caleb Ryan Storms.  It is hard to believe I have ever been known as anyone else.

This was by far one of the more complicated times of my life.  I was trying to transfer all my paperwork over to my new name, While dealing with the residuals of a completely different legal matter that was going on.  Plus trying to explain to my family and friends why I was now Caleb.  

My family took it the hardest, they felt it was in some way a divorce from them and took the whole thing very personally.  I actually thought they would be pleased, oddly enough.  I didn’t think they would want to be associated with an openly gay, gender bending mystic such as myself.  I felt like I was doing them a favor.

As far as the other legal matter, this is quite a story all on its own.  It was late one night and I was feeling particularly down, swimming in my own loneliness and self loathing.  I decided to go to Camp Chesterfield to recharge my batteries.  So a friend an I jump in her car and set off.  

We were almost there when we got pulled over in the lovely Whitley County Indiana.  We were apparently pulled over for speeding, although we were coming off of a ramp, so legally we should have had time to decelerate.  That was the first clue that this was not going to be a reasonable officer.  

He took one look at me and decided I was going to jail for something.  So he began to question us about everything.  I of course was the tragic, angsty conversationalist that I normally was in those days and that didn’t help matters.

He took me in his car and ran my license.  This is where the story gets crazy.  I had a ticket from when I lived in Virginia that apparently was showing up as not being paid.  The crazy thing about this is not only did I send them a money order for it.  I also had received a valid Indiana License since then.  Which means that it was not showing up previous in the DMV records.  

On finding this out he said and I quote “I want you to teletype Virginia and see if we can bring him in on this”.  My heart sunk, this ego with a badge was actually going to charge me with driving on a suspended license from another state!  He also decided that I was suicidal and so I had a nice stay in a bright yellow padded cell.  

Being the good little occultist that I was I noticed that there was a camera in my padded pod.  So I started performing the “Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram” followed by the Black Sun Casting and then the chanting of God Names.  When I had become quite magickally delicious, I sat down to meditate.  At which point an officer came in to ask me what I was doing.  I exclaimed I had religious freedom and he needed to leave me alone.  I was not a model prisoner in the slightest.

Upon going to court however it was a different story,  I cleaned up and presented myself like a well behaved Catholic School Boy.  Even telling the judge that I worked in the radio department of the University of Notre Dame. Which was true at the time.  He basically said that I shouldn’t have been arrested really and gave me time served with the speculation that I would straighten things out with Virginia.  Which I had already done previous to my court date.  My license was suspended for 90 days and that was the end of it, or so I thought.

As it turns out I was hit by a bunch of fees after the fact because I never went back for my Indiana License.  I was also hit with a fee for not showing proof of insurance years after the event.  This is partly why Caleb Storms never drove much, the red tape I would have to weed through just to get a license is ridiculous.

After the name change, the court case and the lesbian’s house I was ready for a change.  I rekindled my relationship with my online crush through the phone. We decided or maybe I just decided to give our relationship a go.  So I packed a few boxes and headed down to Wisconsin to fulfill my internet fantasy.

My dad and step mom drove me over to Madison, where he lived.  That was a very disappointing reality call.  The person I met was not at all the person I fell for.  My first lesson in internet relationships, before there was really an internet.  Anyway, I think I only stayed a few days and then took a bus back home.  Not having a place to live I stayed on some friends couch in exchange for cleaning their house.  That was the beginning of me really looking at who I was and how I wanted to live  It was during this time that Caleb Storms was truly born.

XII: Finding Myself in a Closet

I decided during this time that I needed to figure some stuff out.  I had put it off for as long as I felt like I could.  I had continually found myself crushing on guys, yet dating girls.  The result was always the same.  I would be longing for love, would hook up with a girl.  She would begin to have feelings for me and I couldn’t commit because I didn’t want to have to give up my guy crushes.  So it always ended badly.

The girl from Florida was the last girl I would ever date.  I really liked her and realized that I hurt her very much.  I couldn’t do that to anyone anymore.  So I decided that I wouldn’t date another girl until I figured that out.  I started to slowly talk about my sexuality and even refer to myself as bisexual.  Even this was enough to put many people close to me in shock.  I certainly found out quickly who loved me unconditionally as I started exploring all this.

The range of emotion that I was experiencing at that point in my life was all over the spectrum.  I felt anger, regret, excitement, loneliness, shame and maybe a little hope buried under all that.

At first I began to flirt with a guy online, this was back in the good old days when everything was done in bulletin boards and such.  I got involved in an MOO that was like an interactive text based virtual reality.  This was before the world wide web and we would have to dial up to the university and then hop over to the MOO server.  It took forever to do anything and it was all just lines of green text on a monochrome screen.  

So through our chats I became more and more comfortable with my attraction to other men.  I had begun to express a more feminine look and for a period of time was very endogenous, which was kinda my aim.

Along with my online chatting I met a real live guy during this time.  When I met him however, I never expected us to end up dating.  It wasn’t until I was telling him about a book that I was writing about my lost opportunities for love called “Cupid’s Tears” that the topic was broached.  I told him that much of it had to do with my denial of my sexuality.  He then exclaimed that he was bi as well.  I think he was actually more bi-curious in retrospect.  I was young and new to all this so that was enough for me.

We began a very adolescent like exploration of our sexuality that I thought was very comforting at the time.  I then started to get it, the whole love thing.  I remember thinking to myself that this is what people must be talking about, writing songs about, smiling about.  It was a beautiful feeling as short lived as it was.

I soon moved into a small apartment in town determined to earn my living as a psychic.  I didn’t do very well, I was far too interested in having fun and exploring my new life.  As the friendship continued I was pretty sure I was gay, the bi part of it was the last thing I was clinging on.  My friend however was swinging the opposite way and wanted to keep our relationship a secret.  So at the moment when I wanted to come crashing out of my closet, I stayed in for his sake.

Once it was obvious that we were done, I came out, loud and proud.  My dad called this my Liza Minnelli phase.  Oh, That does remind me about another interesting thing that happened around this time.  I reconnected with my dad and I’m quite glad I did.

I had called my Grandma and she had told me that Dad was back in town and had got married again.  She told me I should call him.  I felt horrible for not staying in touch with my Grandma, but I didn’t mainly because I didn’t want contact with him.  I was so hurt and didn’t feel like I could handle his drinking in my life.  Timing is however key and at that moment, I felt very alone.  My mom didn’t react to the news of my relationship with a guy well, and I wasn’t speaking to my brother.  So I called.

I ended up talking to his new wife for a very long time.  I liked her and told her I was gay and I wasn’t sure how dad would act about all that.  As it turned out Dad kinda knew because of my rather close friendship with my hippy friend in Indianapolis.   I mean I guess it was kinda obvious.  So Dad called me when he got home and invited both me and my boyfriend over for dinner.  That scored major points with me and I forgave Dad for a lot of things on that day. We basically stayed in touch after that point until his death.  Not always consistently but we did stay in touch.  

I can’t tell you how strange it was to meet Dad’s new wife, who I would later affectionately call my “evil step mother”, only because she was actually very kind to me. To top it off having Dad and her meet my boyfriend.  Hell to have a boyfriend at all, and to introduce him that way to a parent was very strange.

Neither of my parents have ever met anyone I have dated since that time.  For whatever reason it was only important that one time.  Honestly there were only a few that I really cared for on that deep of a level.  I will always love him deeply, I hope he has found all he is looking for.

We split and remained friends for some time after.  Until I basically started living a pretty outwardly gay life.  We severed our ties around that time.  During our dating I was still chatting with a guy online.  I mean these days that sounds so bad.  In those days however it was so far from real life, it wasn’t really seen as a threat by anyone.  They knew about each other and it didn’t really matter to either one until my relationship ended and my online romance became my primary one.

So by this time I had moved out of my apartment and moved into a house with a very unstable older lesbian.  It seemed like a good idea at the time, and it was on many levels, but wasn’t perfect by any stretch.  I had built a gay community and was even dating a bit here and there.  One of the guys I was dating would become a valuable friend that I still adore to this day.  He showed me how okay it was to be gay and was also a crazy aloof artist.  It didn’t help that he was pretty.  I would have fallen for him hard, but something told me not to.  I’m glad because I could have and it would have destroyed me.

Anyway, I went back to my crazy magickal practices as a way to manage my grief.  I walked ever so gently into my darkness, the warm darkness that would eventually define me for many people.  I was no longer just angry I was also tragic and began to identify with the many vampire characters in literature.  I became a small shadow creeping around the world, looking for power, meaning, happiness and love.

XI: The land of Gators and Monsters

After it was quite obvious that I was not fit for married life, I decided a geographical fix was in order. So I contacted one of my old radio bosses from Virginia and secured a position at his new radio station in Bradenton, Florida. It didn’t pay the greatest, but it was a radio gig and more importantly it was in Florida.

So two of my friends decided we would make a road trip of it, driving from Indiana to Florida in a van. The trip was loads of fun with only a couple of weird moments. One of them involved a little place in Little Beaver, Pennsylvania.

We had gotten a little turned around, I think we must have needed gas or some such. Anyway, we were in this little town in the middle of nowhere and I really wanted some coffee. So we found this little diner, so as my companions were looking at the map, I was making my way across a gravel parking lot toward this very uninviting diner. I say uninviting because on the marquee it simply said “Strangers”. It didn’t say “Welcome strangers” or “Go away strangers”. It simply said “Strangers”, damn creepy if you ask me.

So there I am walking toward the diner when I heard tires screeching and a beer bottle comes flying through the air. I then heard someone yell “Faggot” as the bottle crashes on the gravel in front of me. At this point I turn on my boots and begin to head back to my comrades, feeling that I didn’t really need coffee that bad.

So we decided to get some directions after that little greeting. We found a convenience store and upon pulling up, quickly realized that is where all the kids hung out. So looking around we found a delivery driver and asked him how to get to the interstate. He looked us up and down, and after telling us he added “you should go before it gets dark”. We all felt unnerved by the statement, even more because it came from a delivery driver. So we hopped in our chariot, and away we went.

My time in Florida started off pretty great, I stayed with my boss and his wife for a week or two, and then they helped me secure a small apartment close to the station. I started to meet people very quickly and it wasn’t long at all before I had a new life I was living. I still had to deal with the fallout from my brief marriage, but for the most part the whole thing started off good.

Then the station and so my job and much of what I was basing my life on at the time were in question. I had began to work on a radio show called “You will Believe” that was going to be a kind of new age, metaphysical talk show, and had even starting selling advertisements for the show. The Station went off the air for what was supposed to be a short time. The time just dragged on and I got deeper and deeper into crazy having nothing but magick and sex to fill my time.

The time I spent in Florida was quite fun for the most part. We would take weekend trips to the Florida Keys. I ran around naked a whole lot, people with pools didn’t seem to mind a naked occultist running around. So I discovered a couple of my favorite things while there. Travel and being naked.

Eventually I gave up on the station and decided to hatch a new plan. I was going to have a traveling occult store. I was going to take all that I had learned from selling shirts with Rod, and all the stuff I had learned from working at the occult store in Virginia and combine them into a traveling metaphysical shop. I thought it could be useful to all those folks in tiny towns that wouldn’t have access to such things. I think at this point I decided that I liked to travel, I had caught the gypsy bug.

So I contacted my brother and to my surprise he agreed to help me finance the venture. So after some negotiating we struck up a deal and I began to contact both suppliers and the organizers of shows to get the ball rolling while I waited for the first chunk of capital to come from my brother. Again I waited far too long and lost the home I was living in. I kept the faith however and moved in with a very tall native American with some friends.

At this point I was dating a little punk girl and practicing the Black Sun System of magick in the extreme. The combination of sex, magick, and being displaced put me in quite a crazy mind set. Although I felt very justified in my rage, in retrospect I was quite insane.

After things came to a head in the house, I was told I was evil and that I had to leave. In those days being told I was evil didn’t phase me, in fact I looked at it as a compliment in some way. Having not received the start-up funds and getting the runaround about it. I decided to take my crazy ass back to Indiana and confront my brother about it all. Not one of my prouder moments.

So burning as many bridges as I could on the way out of town, three of us piled into a car and headed north with whatever would fit into the car. The rest I left for my native American friend for letting us stay. He was always nice to me, it was the owner of the house that thought I was a psycho. He was most likely correct.

Now let me set this next scene up for you. It must have been quite a sight. I had a spiked Mohawk, but the back was long and braided. So I must of looked like some kind of alien. I showed up at my brother’s house all crazy. My poor sister in law had to deal with me, because he wasn’t home. When he got there we had words and he tried to give me a check for gas basically. I was so furious at that point that I ripped it up and tossed it in the air.

Even though my actions were being fueled by a rage spawning from a sense of victimization. My actions although radical were very honest in those days. I did not mask anything, what you saw was what you got. Although I was completely out of control, I believe it was a necessary stage of my personal evolution. It was in many ways my spiritual adolescents.

It would be some years before I would trust my brother again, this was the second time he left me hanging. It was a pattern that would be played out several more times in my life before I got the lesson in it all. Having a brother that is so very different than myself has been the source of many great lessons. It has been a constant source of both frustration and perspective. I would be a much different person if I had not had him in my sphere. I am grateful for him and all he brings to the table.

After that whole episode the crazy kids in my caravan and myself made our way to Mishawaka where we ended up crashing on the couch of a friend of mine. That all started to get very complicated for me personally. I had somehow decided at that point that I didn’t want to date girls anymore, and so wasn’t very interested in the poor girl I had dragged along with me on this adventure. Not to mention the girl we were staying with had several conflicts with my my traveling buddies.

What ended up happening is the girl I was dating went back to Florida and my other friend stayed in town, but found another place to stay. I stayed on that couch for sometime. It became my place of refuge as I figured out my sexual identity.