Up in Fairmount and Other Outer Body Experiences
Dr. Bob Durham
THE ARRIVAL
Fairmont was a small coal mining town nestled in the rolling hills of West Virginia's panhandle with the Monongahela River running right through the middle. Two bridges, one concrete, the other steel, provided travelers free access to both sides. It was a small town where most people knew each other by their first names. It was a friendly town, a safe town. A town where church doors were always open for anyone who wanted to enter, even during the week. Front and back doors to houses were left unlocked, even when the residents were not home. During the summer months, screen doors with wire springs were the only doors used and they were seldom hooked when closed. Cool mountain breezes would ease in through front doors and out the back, filling the houses with fresh air and the sound of children playing. Fresh air served as air-conditioning in Fairmont during the summer months and children's playing reminded everyone of the joy of life. But it was not summer. It was winter in Fairmont...winter..and it was cold.
That morning, slowly...silently...the sun peeked over the horizon, then rose over the small mountain town. But on that morning the sun's brightness was shaded by a thick layer of clouds... it's filtered rays doing little to warm the night air. Throughout the small mountain town, basement coal furnaces roared, forcing thick black smoke from chimneys rising out of snow covered, paint chipped, white wood frame houses. The clear plastic cover on the windows which had frozen over during the night and floor towels jammed against doors to help keep out the cold were not doing their job very well.
Those who ventured out that morning were slapped with the bitter cold of mid-January in the mountains. It was a cold that took your breath away, killed batteries, froze water pipes, watered gas tanks and stuck door locks in place.
But some had ventured out... after all, it was the middle of the week. Schools would be open and men had to work for a living. City buses, with zigzag routes from one side of the small mountain town to the other, had to run. The Baltimore and Ohio railcars were waiting to be filled. Coal mines had to operate. Downtown, Lupo's Hotdogs and other restaurants had to prepare food and open for the day. The Fairmont Hotel, Woolworth's Five and Dime, Hagen's Ice Cream Shop, and the Rexall Drug Store, along with other small shops and newsstands, opened right on time. Children would walk, or be driven, to school. Fathers would go off to work. Mothers would descend to their basements. There they would wash the families' clothes in their Westinghouse washers... squeezing them out by hand and rolling them through the ringer. then, hang them on clothes lines next to their coal furnaces. Radios would be on as company, broadcasting music for the men... allowing moms to escape into their soap-operas. and, bringing everybody updates on the war in Europe and other news from around the world. It would be another bitter cold Winter day in Fairmont. "Business as usual." But not for one family... not for the Durhams of Vermont Avenue.
The Durhams: Mother, Lina and Father, Herb (both avid fans of Jesus Christ and faithful workers in Fairmont's Christian Missionary Alliance Church); sisters, Betty and Janet; and brother, Jerry, were "expecting," you see. They had been expecting for nine long months. They were expecting an addition to the family. A baby, a son, a brother. They were expecting me... Boy, were they in for a surprise!
The angel had volunteered along with the others, but was not given the motorcycle to ride, nor the uniform to wear. He came forward in a long white garment and stood beside the leader, who may have been the Lord, and was assured of HIS equal love. Then he was given a white cap which he immediately shaped into a form of his own liking before placing it upon his head. The others roared off on their motorcycles, while he, and those standing with him in similar white garments, descended to earth... excited... ready to fulfill their missions.
Spirit and body molded together as one, turned, moved down and out into the open, separated, frightened, and most likely already homesick... the loving arms of many, including my Mother welcomed me into the world... and coal smoke rose silently from Fairmont's Emergency Hospital's chimneys. It was January 16, 1942... you'll have to forgive me, it's a day my mind does not remember... but I'm sure my spirit does.
In fact, the first thing I remember. the very first emotion. was one of jealousy. I watched as my Mother nursed a baby. And, while I couldn't put a label on the emotion at the time, I didn't like it. The baby had just been slapped on the cheek as it nursed and told not to bite. Shocked!... and then, the next thing I knew, I was watching Mom nurse another baby. I had never seen that baby before, and I didn't like the fact that it was nursing where I was suppose to be. That was my Mom, not someone else's. Also, my cheek hurt for some unknown reason. But soon my cheek stopped hurting, the baby was gone, and I was back where I was suppose to be. nursing, and feeling warm and loved again.
Occasionally during my early childhood years, the memory of that event would surface, but I never said anything to anyone. I felt sure those types of experiences happened to everyone while they were babies. I'm still convinced of it, even more so today. For, just as I suppressed the memory of that incident for years and kept silent for fear of being laughed at or ridiculed, I'm convinced others do the same. Probably even you. As the years progressed, I simply tucked the memory of that event away. Little did I realize then, that as time passed, I would bring the memory of that event forward and add it to the list.
I never thought life for me as a young boy growing up in Fairmont was that unusual. Though, in looking back, there were those moments of what you would call "revelation," "awakenings," or better yet, "assurances" that there was, and is, more to life than the immediate... more to life than what the senses can reveal.
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