The Underground Man

Rain was dropping down the single glassed window of the main living-room, the only room that had a chimney besides the Great Hall. Between the living-room above the community kitchen a shared bath-room was built in. The next room was for Lucille Champagne to stay. The next room to hers was the library the last room on the first floor of The Abbey of the West Wing, the oldest part of the building. Anna`s living-room was covered all over with carpets and rags to absorb the cracking noise each footstep caused. The building was financially supported by the Heritage Fund, for which reason any renovation and alteration needed their approvement. Not many architects in England were qualified for the mud protection along the inner courtyard. What had been achieved was a colorful patchwork of sand shades across all walls.

Anna sat at the old dark brown heavy oak desk looking out into the square shaped courtyard with flowers blossom so very well. Like a cross were grey stones laid out to make it possible to reach all entrances of the house easily. She felt like writing a long letter to Monika Willers summing up her life. Going down memory lane she remembered he wish to become a child caretaker, now being an Academic in Oxfordshire that knows Plato but prefers Aristotle, loves Seneca, Epicure, Epithet, loves Tolstoy and Kafka, loves reading constitutions something she would have never known of and developed if God had made her childhood dream and wish come true. Never thinking of herself that much that she would ever meet people from The Gandhi Foundation camping each year on the grounds of The Abbey in Sutton Courtenay, so very rich Lords and Sirs, so many famous intellectual people that would share with her eye to eye their insights in and of life. Anna would sock it all in, the new world outside her family history, any piece of knowledge she could get hold of. It was fascinating how easy these people were to deal with once they saw in a person great potential to grow. That The Abbey was also the largest place outside of India with partially original information of and about Gandhi was such a great honor to her. Wolf Graf von Baudessin had been one of her Professors at Hamburg University back than Leader of the German Delegation at the OSCE constitutional meetings sharing with his students whatever was possible to say, was still so much as a great life privilege in her memory. Life had been so intense, so much to learn and discover.

The week before Anna had been to Harley Street in London to meet up with the Doctor of Princess Diana to share her insights into Autogenic Training that she was teaching in her ATC Autogenic Training Center in Abingdon. The manuscript for a training manual was ready in one of her files to be published in due course one day.

Having written the long letter to her mother, Anna got on her bike to ride to Oxford for posting it. The weather was fine, sunny and dry, no problem to reach the old University City in good time. Only few people were walking along River Thames when she reached Abingdon passing the lock that gave way to narrow ships up and down the stream. Abingdon was a sleepy nice town that had changed over time dramatically as the Mini Rover factory nearby had been closed down. New work had come into the city, new faces had appeared. Passing Abingdon while riding on slow pace, Anna immediately stopped. She got off her bike holding it firm in her hands. She looked up to the skies. A white, bright light had struck her, had entered her whole being Anna. She was unable to me, unable to feel, unable to think. Anna had entered another hemisphere, another life, another consciousness, another being herself. She did not understand what was going on in her soul, her boy, her spirit, her mind, in all she was. There was absolute peace, absolute comfort, absolute freedom, absolute certainty, absolute of everything that was her. There was only her and her alone. She had reached, reached finally to know everything there was to know for her, there was herself in all its meaning, its dimensions, its colors, its sights and sounds, its music, its emotions, its intelligence...Anna was born again. The light from heaven had entered her with might, in a second, was there out of the blue. Instantly she had the feeling to be born into something, to be born as a new person. The light was too bright for her to look behind where the light actually was coming from. In fact, she did not question anything, was too overwhelmed by the feeling inside her mind. Unusual to her, thinking was not possible in these moment. She was only there, right there, no need to be shaken, no need to ask for anything, no need to think, no need to worry, no need to talk...only to be. Like in trance was she not seeing her standing in the middle of the path along River Thames that she was blocking the way for couples and families to pass. No sound hit her ears, no eyes looking angrily at her were in sight of her vision. She was there, standing firm on her ground that was her place to be. She was there, had reached finally, had been given a new meaning, had agreed, had taken into her spirit, and had allowed to be taken over in all she was. The old Anna faded away from one second to the next, was a mere memory of the past only. Anna felt like being born into something, right there on the spot, right into England. It was not the feeling she thought she must have had when her own mother had given birth to her. It was a much deeper feeling, a feeling she was able to reflect on, a feeling to carry her soul and spirit into a clearer future to be all herself and nothing but herself. Anna stopped breathing for a few moments to feel the moment in all its dimensions, not letting out any feeling through her nose, her mouth or any other part of her body. She wanted to capture the feelings in all that she was. Anna looked down to reassure herself that she was completely intact; no parts missing, even the bike was still with her. Her mind was coming slowly back to reality, she saw people around her looking worried at her. Some of them were thinking to approach her and ask her of her wellbeing. Kids playing around her did not mind Anna or se the transformation in her statue. She had changed, years of neglect that God really exists, were gone. He had taken her over by force. It was in his time to take control over Anna and make her his instrument of his peace. She had no chance to think or feel otherwise. She was born new again, and it felt right, so right for her. With all that she was Anna knew she had a mandate to fulfill, to follow her new owner, her new master that had come and use her for his own plans. Anna was now a child of God, a Christian realizing in this moment all years passed fighting the idea that there is a force in this world others call God can never be true, had gone. She had arrived in a new life, a life disconnected from her physical life, her date of birth. Wherever she was supposed to be, whatever she was supposed to think, she knew it would all be submitted to a higher authority, to God and God alone. As she was a person like Thomas always to think and think and wanting to see to believe, she now had found rest in believing the unseen, things not from the world around human life. Trusting in something invisible was no longer hard for her as she had seen the light that took over her life. Her mother was still in her, the doubts, the uncertainly, the questions, the fear, but in that moment Anna knew that she will always have her mother’s character in her as long as she will live, but the effects will not limit her from achieving greatness in life and see more and more, meet more and more helpers to lift her up. Her sense, her instinct trying to understand every corner of life was overwhelming and people saw her hunger for understanding stretching out a helping hand.

When reaching Oxford she dropped her letter into the nearest red Post Office box, bought Champagne and cake in one of the shops, rode back to The Abbey in Sutton Courtney and gathered all friends present to celebrate the day as her new birthday. They all laughed sharing their idea with her that they always had known she was a Christian. Anna laughed and her eyes got open. Looking back into her past she had always being in Christian communities, helped to set up social projects connected to the Church in one or the other way.

"How stupid I was not to see!" said Anna when allowing Sebastian from Canada to pour her another glass of Champagne. "In all those years past...how stupid!"

"Everything in life has its time...God is never too early or too late...only we think like that, but never him", explained Sebastian that was a Monck in a monastery in Ontario on route to join fellow brothers in the south of France. "God is not like us, when he wants you to walk in the darkness and wilderness...for him no problem as he knows your time. When it is your time, he will call you by your name and take you under his wings...forever."

"I am so...so...so happy", laughed Anna biting into a big piece of chocolate cake. "Chocolate...that is me!"

"Chocolate...that is her!" laughed Sebastian also and the rest of the friends joined in.

"Chocolate is her...is all she is!" said the chorus.

….to be continued