The Parallel Universe

As somebody predicted a while back: 80 years in 80 chapters.


Chapter 80: Avalon is now online:

https://www.ttbrown.com/defying_gravity/80-avalon.html

Just marking my spot so that I can be first in line!

OK. First comment,

I feel sort of like I am one of that group of people at Dr. Browns funeral. Out of the corner of my eye seeing Morgan .... Sorrowing over the loss of a man who must have meant a great deal to him, but no more than what he meant to his wife and daughter, grandaughter ... son and son in law. I can understand why Morgan did not step forward. His relationship did not include all of them.

How hard it must have been then and later to separate himself from Linda and Josephine and especially when Josephine was fading away .....

Losses ....... and now for all of us .... we have lost Morgan too .... which Paul knows .... I did not expect.... so in my own way I am shocked and saddened. Though, I should have known.

Mr. Twigsnapper has been there at our right hand side, like the battle horse that he would admire I am sure but there has never been a direct word from Morgan in these forums and I have wondered and worried about that.

Sometimes you just know in the back of your mind what the truth must be but you just don't want to see it. I am sad because I really felt through this book that I had gotten to know the man. Especially his response to Lindas declaration of love! I found that revealing and charming and endearing. Thank you Paul for telling his story too because I think that you have managed to do that and somehow he knew that you could. Victoria

I have so many comments its going to take me a very long time to get them all together. For now all I want to do is congratulate you Paul for getting to " THE END" in one mental piece. Its a POWERFUL STORY Paul and you have told it well.

Perhaps all of our reactions will be a help in the rewrite that I know will be in front of you.

Being the red pen fanatic that I am, I notice minor proofreading slips .... which I know will be corrected. The main thrust of the story is not diluted though because of them. Its just that I notice the little things and my little red pen begins to quiver!

Ah! So many things to ask but I will stand aside until everyone has had a chance to read this last chapter and your fine epilogue. Its your voice that rises to the surface here Paul and thats a good thing. Like being part of the wind which Linda heard coming up the canyon. We are all the wind .... We ARE. MarkC

I have so many strange feelings at the moment that all I can say is

Brilliant Paul

Is it me?, or is there a cat in the O of brown?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avalon
The Burn Jones pre-raphalite picture is so apt for a fallen hero?, with the harp playing?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zJdbpzfJMs
Roxy music Avalon.
Kevin

I just can't tell you Paul how moving that scene is (with Josephine picking out Townsends last garments to wear for his last trip and of course the comment .... But he always came home.) That was as as heart wrenching this time as it probably was then. And I know that we have Linda Brown to thank for all of that...what other biographer could possibly have gotten this close to the family of a man? . To be able to speak of this last moment?Packing for this last trip. Its just so extraordinarily intimate it makes me fill with emotion for them, even now.

I have never read a more moving account of a family discovering that their father/grandfather has died. So sweet and sad. Fell asleep ...." slept away from us" she said .............
MarkC

This chapter certainly brought Townsend Brown alive – which he is, of course, as ever. A recent visit to Cahuilla country in the southern California desert had a similar effect. I was able to visit Andrea and Frou’s Frou’s in Palm Desert and appreciate the beautifully crafted wands as well as a number of cute dogs. On a walk around, I happened to see a small rock which looked like it had been hand-molded like stretchy taffy or jiggly jello into a facsimile of a human face with two holes for eyes and a thumb sized indentation for the mouth. I couldn’t help but smile and think of Townsend Brown. I kept it as an appropriate souvenir. James Barrett’s experience with the rock molding lady in Hawaii also came to mind. As I drove the desert highways in my silver Saab convertible – a “silver machine” in its own right – I remembered Townsend’s love of convertibles as mentioned in Paul’s story. I’m looking forward to a future ride in a gravity defying Brown-branded silver machine, which I’m sure will eventually become available.

The numerous incredible rock formations I encountered on my trip brought Kevin and his special dowsing rods to mind. I’ll bet they would have been quivering like Mark’s little red pen.

Now Flow and I and others with a project underway will need to follow Paul’s example and wrap ours up. Congratulations on your twenty chapters, Flow! It will be great. Mine keeps being delayed, and a two week trip is about to intervene, but I’m on it -- slow but sure. Some things are becoming clearer, too.

As ever,

Griffin

kevin.b wrote:I have so many strange feelings at the moment that all I can say is

Brilliant Paul

Is it me?, or is there a cat in the O of brown?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avalon
The Burn Jones pre-raphalite picture is so apt for a fallen hero?, with the harp playing?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zJdbpzfJMs
Roxy music Avalon.
Kevin

Yeah. .

Bryan Ferry - Avalon Lyrics


Now the party´s over
I´m so tired
Then I see you coming
Out of nowhere
Much communication in a motion
Without conversation or a notion
Avalon
When the samba takes you
Out of nowhere
And the background´s fading
Out of focus
Yes the picture changing
Every moment
And your destination
You don´t know it
Avalon
When you bossanova
There´s no holding
Would you have me dancing
Out of nowhere
Avalon



Oh my goodness, so much of what was murk is now pure sunshine.

This fascinates me and I hope that you have an answer to my question. Linda makes this remark which you have included in the Chapter.

"The hills were emerald and smooth and soft looking,” Linda noted, “they looked like professionally trimmed golf courses. It was a great Christmas Day. I got some good pictures of Mom and Dad enjoying themselves, which, after the stress of this month, was really nice to see.”

Paul, Linda ... do those pictures still survive? Might we see them in this section of the chapter? It just seems to call out for them somehow. Do they still exist?

Great link Langley. Thanks Victoria

Paul,

it would be nice to see a picture of your Dads boy scout pin in the Epilogue since it played such a large part in the storys ending ... as well as Morgans Thump stick. Strikes me that readers might enjoy seeing the actual items.

Hope you are really enjoying your time off. As you can see ..... the forum has been jumping! Its been wonderful but I am looking forward to your input once you get home and get the sand out of your shoes!

And do you remember the pictures that Victoria is referring to? As I recall they were in black and white but I just can't remember if you have it in your files or I have it in mine.

Elizabeth

This is what Robert Bly has wisely said, if you don't go down into it voluntarily, at some point later it will reach up and drag you down into it, grief.

I know this bridges both 80 and the Epilogue, but I have other comments for that thread so I'm putting all this here under the one heading, because it is all tied together for me.

I had, as I'm sure we all had, fully expected the last chapters to include information about TTB's last days, and his eventual death. However I hadn't realized with what incredible poignancy these moments would be evoked. My hat is off to you Paul. Not just for this, but for the entire work, which now can be viewed as a whole. Whenever we may be in the same vicinity, you will never have to buy your own beer (or whatever your drink of preference).

And Charles and Helen, news at once of their love, quickly followed by details of both their deaths. Great Scott! I can hear Paul's future book agent counseling to "...tone it down a bit in the ending, it's all so hard for the average reader to bear." But I prefer it this way, like bitter coffee, sharp on the tongue. Call no man happy indeed, this is a celebration of all of their lives, and in learning their endings, we see the arc in full appreciation of its majesty.

And then Josephine. "I knew you'd come, Son." At that point I was so close to weeping. Bless that boy for coming to visit his surrogate momma.

All of that said, what I was totally not prepared for was Morgan's death. Very selfishly, I had expected him to be around rattling our cages for many years to come. I had grown to depend on that, it had become an article of faith that some things had to be right in the world if he and his team were out there, doing what they do best. If they ever made that sleek silver vehicle into a single-seater with handle-bars, I count on him riding it into eternity. Somewhere there is that island campfire, several guitars, may we all meet there some day.

R.

PS. So if Morgan was the heir to Sir William and Blinker Hall, who is heir to Morgan?

Reading over the chapters and some of these responses. Can't sleep and restless tonight for some reason.

I agree with the question Radomir ( who is the next Morgan then? who is his heir?) and your feelings too about losing Morgan. Somehow I thought the same as you, that somehow we would be able to get to know him even better after his responsibility of helping Paul with the book was over.

I liked the guy, seeing him through the eyes of the young girl who was so in love with him .... and the older gentleman who obviously regarded him with great respect and pride ... (after he took a rolled up magazine to him!)

Morgans words rang so true when he was trying to describe his feelings when Linda spoke those terrifying words " I love you." You hafta laugh at his predicament and of course I did because I was remembering being in that exact spot and having my legs freeze to the floor. I loved the fact that he rode a bike ...... I think all of us loved the standoff between Morgan and Dr. Brown over the motorcycle riding.

And I thought it was touching that he would be there at the cemetery but not interfer with Lindas island life. And that he would make a point of coming to see Josephine in the hospital.

I just flat liked the guy. And I am keeping the positive thought that somehow he has figured a way to make that beach party he mentioned to Paul. Alot of beach parties because I want to be there too. MarkC

I agree with the both of you guys. There must be an heir, or else Morgan faked his death AGAIN.

Why not!!

It is too easy to just let this whole issue just float until such time as the beach party does occur.

Trickfox