Guru Gary

“Are you coming tonight?”, the overly cheerful voice on the phone seemed to plead for confirmation immediately, to validate the reason for calling late in the afternoon after I have had a long day already. Exhaustion and a need to just pull back into my recliner and let the day pass overwhelmed every living, breathing, human inch of me. I promised I would go to the class with her, despite the fact that I wanted nothing to do with tarot readings or any other divination tools. It meant a lot to her in the newly found spirituality that she wanted me to embrace too. The unfortunate part was I had already walked that crazy path of psychics and the paranormal but she had not and a little hand holding support was what she really wanted from me.

          “Yes, I will meet you there in about 30 minutes. I need to grab a bite and change my clothes really quick, so give me another minute or two, please? Just don’t make friends with the levitating people until I get there, okay? I’ll see you soon!” I hung up quickly and made a dash to the bathroom to wipe my face and get a fresh shirt on. I put my half-eaten dinner into the microwave, I took a head count to make sure all three cats were accounted for and not locked in a closet, then I grabbed my keys and bag as I hustled out the door. Another evening to rest lost to a promise to be there for someone, who is perfectly capable of attending an event all by herself but scared that there might be a boogieman in the crowd.  A promise is a promise and I do not break them if I make them. In an hour, I can warm up my meatloaf and mashed potatoes and take it easy.

The Planetary Harmonic Emporium is an odd conglomeration of magic, mysticism, and some pretty far-out tie-dyed clothing. I have spent a good bit of money and time there years ago. I still pop in when I get a wild hair to see what is new or just putter around the books. The little metaphysical store had a larger conference area that the owner rented out for crystal and energy fairs on the weekends Tonight’s class my friend wants me to enjoy with her was being presented by a psychic who was explaining a special card deck, that was to be used with an equally special set of stones, that only he knew how to use. However, if you were willing to toss fifty dollars into his basket on his reading table, he would teach you how to use this amazing tool of enlightenment. He had rented that whole back area for this class and a banner across the front entrance made it seem that Edgar Cayce himself had returned from the great beyond for this moment in time. 

Usually, something like this would be set up for a Saturday night event. I felt odd walking in on a Thursday evening because I typically would head out to the early art walks downtown with my other friends. Allie wanted me to experience this with her, because the guy “knew” what he was doing, she was ready to throw another fifty dollars into the kitty for the whole kit and caboodle the guy was huckstering to the crowd. If ever I wondered how this place keeps going on rocks, gongs, and incense, it is because of people like Allie that can’t get enough of the spiritual hustle and instantaneous insight from a chunk of quartz, with water dribbling on chimes, in a cloud of Nag Champa. Not to say I wasn’t like that too, occasionally reading my own beads late at night, but I found what I needed and it did not involve a taffeta unicorn with streamers.

We took our seats, thankfully close to the door and in the back of the room. The psychic, who went by the name Guru Gary, walked in as if he was communicating silently to beings no one else could see or hear. Some folks stood and bowed to him, some had tears in their eyes, other got their notebooks ready for the sudden wisdom that would eventually come from Gary’s pursed lips. Allie and a few others bounced up and down, clapping wildly as if they were in the presence of a Facebook celebrity. For myself, I was the curmudgeon who could care less about this man’s aura but intrigued that this guy had such a response from everyone. I put my foot in the aisle, ready to make a break if he started glow or spin around or both.

His eyes finally came off of the acoustic tile above our heads and he looked at each and every one of us in attendance. He smiled beautifully and he bowed to the group. “So far, so good to this point,” I thought to myself, as I watched him carefully open the box of cards he personally designed to communicate with spirits, guardian angels, and sacred symbols. As he laid out the cards and picked out some aquamarines, tourmalines, and jaspers, I was half out of my seat and starting to slink toward the curtain. Allie was so focused on the ritual he was performing; she had no idea I was less than a second away from bolting to freedom.

Guru Gary boomed out across the room, “Please allow me to demonstrate the power of the Card of Release with the Stone of Love. Will the woman by the curtains give me the honor of her presence so that I may show the effectiveness of these energies?”

I was busted and it was all I could do not to spew expletives. I turned around and smiled weakly as Allie glared appallingly at my near escape. All I wanted was my recliner and supper and now I was about to be brought into the light of Guru Gary’s Amazing Energy Deck and Crystal Conveyance System. Where is that taffeta unicorn when I need it? I walked up to the reading table on the stage and Gary offered me a chair. It was time to face the music of the spheres and accept my fate.

I have no idea what happened next, but I am certain no aliens grabbed me and took me to their mothership, to have a chip implanted somewhere on my body. I sat in that chair like a rod was strapped to my back and my hands glued to the black satin table covering. As Gary elucidated on the premise of the energies behind the release and the love frequencies that would free me of my quiet world, my tiny cubicle in a world of boxes and gopher holes, to become this magnificent guide for others into peace, love, and harmony, I could almost hear the angels sing above the guy in the front row munching on wasabi peas. A weird rumination came to mind, as he was informing the spellbound in the audience about the cards and stones. There was a time I was more gregarious and likely to do things more freely and be open to new ideas. I was fun and the life of the party. What happened to the gal who loved to engage with life, had the freedom to always do what she wanted when she wanted? Gary kept spinning yarns to the group and he would do these broad gestures above my head and around the area where I sat. I started to feel like I was being prepped for transport to another dimension- God! I wished I finished my dinner!

A sense of peace came over me and I was overwhelmed by it. I was becoming entranced by the notion I could be one with all of the elements of life. It wasn’t the need to hide from the world that made me want to stay home and not deal with things. I wasn’t giving myself the love I wanted and desperately craved to get out of that house and see what the world had waiting for me to enjoy, to experience, to fall in love with and become the person that I really am!

Gary gasped and started that faked expression to enforce the effectiveness of his magic, “As you can see, this kind lady is transformed into the very shaman from within! The power of the cards and stones has brought the Universe into her soul and she is free and happy, love abounds in this woman’s heart!”

Gary spoke to the crowd in that less than sincere awe type of loud whisper. He has been on the circuit for a long time and he was good at wriggling dollar bills from places people had no idea that money could be found there. “You too can have the power of the cards and the stones for fifty dollars, and you can have this power tonight!”

The gleam in his eyes, the slight turn of the corners of his mouth in an expression of purity and joy, he was working them harder than the girls out by the naval base. He turned to me with a flourish, to demonstrate his example of using the great spiritual prowess of his capabilities and selling kits of these cards and rocks to the minions aimlessly following him to the cash register. The Pied Piper of Pure Nonsense was leading the mice to mortgage their homes to be his followers. Allie was locked into the laser beams of the moment and I saw the fifty dollars come out of her wallet, headed right for Gary’s open and expectant sweaty palm to grease another set of gears. I knew that I couldn’t allow her to be sucked into his charms and watch her eat ramen noodles for the rest of the month.

I jumped up out of the chair and knocked the table over. A woman fainted and another guy ran for the money basket that spilled all over the floor. Guru Gary dove into the melee from the stage edge like an Olympic swimmer as more and more people ran to rescue their cash from the snake oil spiritualist. I snatched Allie’s hand and pulled out her through the curtains while she protested, she wanted that card deck and crystals. We ran out of the store just before the cops ran in to break up the fight. Allie was still screaming about not being able to have the power that Guru Gary could have blessed her with as I threw her into the car, peeling out of the parking lot before we wound up arrested.

“Did you keep your money? I will give you that fifty back and I will find you that stinking card deck and gravel bits too. I am sorry if I ruined your evening but that is one dangerous dude! Allie, not every alleged guru is true to their spirit or the spirt of God. Why don’t you come with me this Sunday to a place that is really about spirituality, life, and what you can learn about yourself as you get to know God? All that these people, like that Guru Gary, want is your adoration of their ego and ensure their bank account is nicely padded. Are you ready to learn what it is to be whole in the Light?” I was reticent about the whole thing but I knew she had her heart set on an amazing experience from this pseudo-class informercial style hustle.

Allie looked up at me as I turned into the driveway to drop her off. “I had no idea you had that in you. You just go to work, go to school to study things outside of your job, volunteer- boring! But what I saw tonight, I was wrong about you.”

I looked at her and I was confused. “Wrong about what? Yeah, that is what I do and yeah it is boring. It’s my life and no, it doesn’t often have a room clearing brawl for excitement.”

She opened the door and as she stepped out of the car, she turned to me and said, “I guess what I really should have asked is are you coming over tonight here?” A smile slowly came across her face and I could feel my face get red across my cheeks. I guess my meatloaf might be sitting in the microwave the rest of the night.