22: Golden Harmonica

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At the end of the summer witnessing campaign I received a call urging me to come and see my father, who was dying of cancer. I took the bus from Boston and showed up unexpectedly — in case they had faith breakers waiting for me. Our team had a sister kidnapped shortly after we arrived in Atlanta, so I wasn't taking any chances. It was difficult being at home; If I stayed too long it would have been hard to keep the faith.
            Sitting around the kitchen table with my mother, I tried to share about Rev. Moon and his life. But Ma wanted me to talk more about myself. Before dinner my father said, "You don't have to pray; none of us go for religion around here."        Sam Green picked me up in his blue Volkswagen and we had a long talk driving to Toronto. I stayed at his place overnight. He said that if I ever wanted to leave the church he would send me the airfare. I felt Sam would be more positive than Paul Nash who had been sending me negative letters.

             Mary and I went to a nearby park to let their two kids play. Mary told me that Paul had just called and would be coming by, having not seen her for eight months. Paul showed up on bike and said, "You're still a Moonie, aren't you?"
            "Yes," I replied. Then he and Mary completely ignored me, from that moment on so I left them. Paul had gone out of his way just to ignore me.
            An hour later while talking to some people at By the Way Cafe, Paul interrupted me. "People don't like Moon because he used surreptitious means to buy some property near Boston. Your church is just like the CIA..."
           Later, that evening, when I sang A Miracle America at Fatal Berts', Paul stood in the back snickering. When I first joined the church, Paul wrote me that he had a conversion experience while dodging the draft. He got into Christianity when he first came to Toronto, but gave up on it when he "came to his senses." Paul sent me a get-well card when I told him I was at Camp K and included some negative articles from the New York Times. "You lose your apartment, your appendix, your job, your girlfriend and you turn to religion." 

At the beginning of 1979, when I was having a miserable time, a "friend" would have been nice to have around. Miriam decided to break up with me and I quit my job, not long after that Miriam threw a surprise party for me at an Indian restaurant. Then I found work at a post office in a jewelry store and my appendix burst. Miriam was watering my plants when the jeweler's called to say that I was fired. I lost my apartment and moved out of the neighborhood; then moved to a studio apartment with no windows. The new apartment was near my old one.
            Paul rarely came to visit; we only ran into each other at the coffee houses. I was taking courses in Pre-University English, tennis and gourmet cooking. One day Paul showed up at my place with a newspaper clipping. It was about two trapeze artists named Lu Anne and Louise, who coincidentally had the same name of the characters in my scatological parody of the Daring Young Man on The Flying Trapeze. That was one of the rare times that he came to visit.
            By that time I had an overwhelming urge to go to California. I ran into Bud Rose — he had told everyone at one of my parties that my chocolate covered peanut butter balls were 'carcinogenic because they had paraffin in them.' We decided to go to California together.

Not all my friends were negative about the Unification Church. Alcatrash told me that John Wesley set up some good programs and was persecuted, maybe Rev.  Moon was doing the same thing. At home my mother showed me a negative magazine article about our church. "You don't have to read it she said, just look at the pictures. I can see that they're good people. You know what newspapers do when some one does something good, they try to discredit them."

After I joined we left the Bay area with two busloads headed for Atlanta. Our first stop was in Los Angeles, where we fund raised. After a pep talk from Libby M on March 31, we went out selling candy. "I love the song God Bless America. Father's a patriot of America and has sacrificed himself for this nation. He taught me how to love my country. I started loving America more when I went into shop after shop loving people. Any questions."
            "How can you make consistent amounts of money?"
            "Sincerity."
            "How do you get someone to give after they say no."
            "Don't look at fundraising as just a way to make people to give. Some one who had shut the door on God may open it when we show up with a smile. They see something attractive in what we are doing and are motivated to give."

I fund raised with peanut brittle; there was a box of 24 for each of us. Ninety of us sold everything except for three boxes. I was positive and only encountered one negative person. Our bus had thirty people in it, headed west. The baggage was piled high in the back, steel folding chairs were in the aisles making it difficult to get around on the bus. We made over $500.00 in one day, enough to keep us going for a couple days. About thirty stayed to pioneer in LA.
            Stopped at Grand Canyon, 60 of us in the two buses. We stood at the lookout; threw snowballs and took pictures. Each of us was given seventy-five cents to spend; most bought six post cards for forty-one cents and thirty cents for a candy bar. I wrote to my brother Danny about throwing snowballs over the edge.

As we drove along I played guitar in the front of the bus. Everyone was studying and reading Father's words. Towels were hung up to dry. The other bus would pull alongside and the brothers did skin the cats from the baggage racks. I slept above the baggage at the back of the bus, a most precarious place. We gathered in a circle under the Gateway Arch, and I sang A Miracle America.   Arrived in Atlanta on the night of April fifth, and had dinner at the Varsity, a big college eatery. Stayed at a Baptist dormitory and spent Easter weekend selling flowers.

We found a house to rent in Atlanta, and began witnessing and fund raising in    preparation for the Colorado workshop. We had no furniture except for a table and chairs in the kitchen. The table had a newspaper tablecloth. For a week or so I led the team fund raising around Atlanta. I still have the scraps of paper with the members names, the drop off points pick up times and our poor results. I was very inexperienced and didn't use the area wisely.








           In September, upon returning to Atlanta, Howard Self had become the new director of South East Carp. We spent a lot of time behind a book table at Georgia State University witnessing to students. Sometimes we would pass out CARP's student newspaper, the World University Times. To support our activities we went out fund raising; I saw every neighborhood in Atlanta, and the surrounding towns. I met Correta King one time; she was cordial, but politely declined to support our efforts. On September 29, 1980 I wrote home: "The other day Tiger Park flew in to speak to out whole region; about 50 CARP members were here for the day. We went to the park for a picnic and played baseball."

Around that time that I felt that Tiger Parks' visit should have been documented, and wanted to learn photography. "Have been spending the last couple weeks up at the farm," I wrote a month later, "Last night three brothers and myself slept by the campfire beneath a full moon. We can still go swimming in the river up the ways, there is a rope to swing on. We had a square dance."
            I had a guest who traveled around the world and talked of seeing a herd of blue whales in their sleep passing his sailing ship. He did not move in. Carol came down from Toronto and visited the workshop as the Church leader gave a sermon on "Religious Affectations." During her visit some one drove over my empty guitar case with a van.

I went to the Atlanta Airport on January 13, 1981 to sell foil prints at our first amendment booth. "A young lady was moved by our work and gave us a yellow rose." We all took turns going to the booth. There were four concourses, with about 40 gates on each. It was the world's largest airport. There were three other groups at the airport, The Hare Krishna's, A Christian group, and Nuclear Fusion, Lyndon * LaRouche's group.

One day the airport assigned me to work out of the same booth with the Nuclear Fusion group. The results of that encounter were the farthest thing from fusion. When a person came to my side of the booth the Nuclear Fusion woman would say "Don't talk to him, he's a Moonie!" Howard Self told me what to do if her attacks on me became personal. "Don't get too close to her — she has VD." This created a lot of excitement.

            I was fund raising at the airport around the time John Lennon was shot, and when John Hinkley attempted to kill President Reagan. I saw it on a tiny television above a bar.

 Mothers logbook: "Fern died today..."

  -->  At the end of February my brother called informing me that my father had died. I flew to Toronto and was met at the airport by a strange woman in a black Volkswagen. She looked at my photograph then looked at me and said, "Bob asked me to pick you up." At home Terry, Rick and Kim were taking care of things. Ma was happy that I came. The relatives were starting to arrive.
            I woke up the next morning with uncle Tony scolding me, "Your brothers are upset that you joined that Church. Danny is very hurt. I believe in God myself, and worship in my own way; you can worship in your own way too, but you don't have to be in a cult." I got out of bed on the day of my father's funeral apprehensive about what the other relatives would be saying.
             McHearsey's funeral home took care of everything; I was surprised by the large number of people attending. When the seven children joined with our mother around the casket before it was closed I prayed silently for my father. He was buried at Evergreen Cemetery.
            Back at home, when it was all over, there were drinks and refreshments. Smoke filled the air, as our relatives gathered, like clouds before a storm. I was talking to some cousins about the movement, when an aunt on the lumberjack side started criticizing Rev. Moon rather loudly. I pointed my finger at her and said, "You don't even know him, you have never met him; you have no right to pass judgment on him."

She disappeared, then came back and apologized. "I'm sorry, Stefan," she said, "You have the right to believe anything you want." I went up to Danny's room to get away from everything, and Danny's girlfriend came in and tried to seduce me.

Late that night when everyone had gone, I sat at the kitchen table with Rick, his wife, Maureen, and my mother. Rick grilled me on my faith, especially about arranged marriages. He said that it would lead to "Inbreeding;" that the arrangements would probably be done "by computer." Rick then asked, "What if you meet someone you like on the side, are you free to go off on your own." I told him that I had made a commitment and wasn't looking for something on the side.
            I was tempted to ask Rick, "What if you meet someone you like, do you go off on the side?" but didn't.
            At last my mother took me upstairs, and dragged out a collection of prayers and religious poems she had been saving over the years in a puzzle box. She had never shared with me this side of her faith before.

Terry drove me to Toronto the next day and I visited Sam and Mary. I got a call from Paul Nash saying that he could no longer be my friend, but it had to be me that broke off the relationship. My reply was "It is as you say."
            Later I was sitting at By the Way Cafe with Alcatrash when Paul Nash sat at the next table with his fiancée. They totally ignored me. I stopped in at the Toronto Unification Church while they were having a "Japanese Night," with sushi and sisters in Kimonos and then walked over to Fatal Berts, which was not far away.
            Sam Green picked me up after Fatal Berts and took me to his new apartment. As his two children played with some toys on the floor, Sam tuned in a Christian program on the television. "They all drive nice cars," he said. It was late when Mary came home after a night out with the girls. She offered me some Mocha Roma tea and talked a long time. The next morning Sam drove me to the airport for my flight to Atlanta. And that was the last time I saw Sam, Mary and Paul Nash.

At Central City Park in Atlanta on March 23, 1981, Howard Self led a counter demonstration against the Atlantans Concerned for El Salvador. CARP did several demonstrations nationwide to protest Soviet involvement in Central America. There was a picture of me in the CARP monthly holding a picket sign and arguing with someone.
            I was put in charge of a small center for one week, and Michael, the one brother on my team complained to Howard about my unique leadership style. I would tell him to get up, and then fall back to sleep myself. Then I'd wake up half an hour later and say "Mike, aren't you up yet!"
            Witnessing on campus, fundraising and protesting Soviet meddling in Central America was not an easy task. Joanna grew tired of us singing Rocky Mountain High, as we prepared for a big workshop. She was one of our few full time students at Georgia State University, where we witnessed and had trouble balancing our controversial activities with her academic career. She left before our Colorado workshop.
      From June 15 to 21 we were at Snowmass, attending lectures, piling into Jacuzzi's and climbing trails. Sitting on the side of a mountain I wrote Little Mountain Flower, a song to express my sadness over Joanna leaving.
            When we left Colorado our blue school bus dubbed Moon Eagle conked out. Howard Self paired up the brothers and had them hitch hike to Atlanta. I had to split up with my partner because no one would pick us up. I got a ride with an Amish barn-raiser near Nashville. While driving he pointed out every barn in the distance; and told me all about the cattle inside. I woke at his house the next morning and looked out the window as the sun turned the telephone wires to gold. I had breakfast with them and sang A Miracle America.

Howard Self put me on the workshop staff as a song leader. I told Howard that I wanted to buy a camera to photograph our rallies for the CARP monthly. He thought that was a good idea. We had one guest with brittle bones and waist length hair but he didn't join. Another guest admitted to burning the shoes of some spiritual group while he was a surf bum and would wake up in the middle of the night speaking in tongues.

On August 30, 1981 I wrote on a postcard: "I went on an outing climbing Blood Mountain with South East Carp. Will be spending the next month into October in Flowery Branch. Shot a roll with my new camera. I'll have a couple nice shots with me, and the mountain to send you. Things are going well I get lots of exercise with volleyball and swimming. Take care — give my love to Danny and the rest. "
            The workshop site was actually a secluded brick bungalow with a forest in the back yard. Howard visited the house one night and very diplomatically gave me an eel skin wallet. "God had other plans for you, you won't be needed as a song leader. " Just as I was about to leave Flowery Branch Tiger Park, visited and went swimming with us. At the time Tiger Park spoke on: The Story of Joshua in Germany.

Tiger Park said Father once told him the revelation that he had with Jesus wasn't true, that it was just a story he had made up; that he wasn't the Messiah. Then Father looked at Tiger Park to see his reaction. Tiger Park knew that father was just testing him and said, something like, "If it isn't true then I'll make it true. Only someone who knows Jesus as deep as you do could teach us to live our lives the way Christ would have us." That was the response that Father wanted to hear.

South East CARP took the Moon Eagle bus to New York for the October 22, 1981 Folly Square Rally, where Father proclaimed his innocence in a trumped up tax case. I photographed the event, as well as Howard speaking to the Region on the second floor of the New Yorker, in front of a large painting of Father's early days in Korea.
            After Folly Square I went with a fundraising team in Florida with wall scrolls. I documented our efforts in black and white. With fundraising over I spent the first week of the New Year in Gainesville, then went to the 120-day training session at the New Yorker, from January until May.
            The annual CARP Seminar was held in Snowmass, Aspen Colorado from June 6 to 13. Hyo Jin Nim Moon performed with his group Yu Band and I got a good photograph of him doing a brief martial arts demonstration. I won the CARP songwriting contest, for Revolution of Heart and was presented a plaque by Reverend Choi, who took over CARP temporarily after Tiger Park went to spirit world. The only good line in my song was: 'We're golden fish in a muddy stream destined to endure.'

GOLDEN HARMONICA

A French Canadian his name was Fernand
Went off to a War with an old marine band
At Picadilly Circus with buddies on leave
Fern says, "That girl, she'll marry me

Angels came down when that harp was played
They wanted to waltz in a circus parade

Joy took the Britannia to Halifax
Her train was greeted by wild lumberjacks
They settled in Toronto had six children more
I was conceived between domestic wars

Dad favored my brother with grease on his hands
He couldn't get into my grandiose plans
I could remember he hurt me as long as I live
But what's the use you go on and forgive

I played a wild blues harp on my very first gig
And Fern was so happy he danced up a jig
I got an apology from his dying bones
I left a gold harp on his tombstone