PART ONE Chapter Five

ON THE ROAD AGAIN

After I'd served my apprenticeship in Vancouver, the guides started moving me around the country. They weren't ones for giving me much notice either. Generally I'd get just a couple of hours warning.

One Thursday morning, for example, I was eating breakfast when the thought came, "You're going to the prairies." I didn't really know whether to believe it or not, but my confirmation came in the form of a horoscope, of all things. I seldom look at the horoscopes in the paper, but just for the heck of it, right after the thought about the prairies, I turned to the thing and there under Libra, it said, "Travel plans are known by those in high places. It's time you should know." I just said "Wow!". I mean, there was somebody talking to me. When I got home that evening, I told Sharon, "I get the feeling that I'm supposed to go to Saskatoon." She agreed with me, that my feeling was right, then surprised me by saying she felt I should go to Regina as well.

So the next morning she drove me to the airport just as if I was going on a business trip.

I walked into the ticket counter, and you know, I really shouldn't have been able to get on, on such short notice, but there I was, ticket in hand getting on the plane. Now, the people I was sitting beside told me that this was ‘the' flight to take, to get to Saskatoon. It had a meal and so on. Most people preferred this flight over the others.

"You're lucky to get on this flight," they said. And I agreed. I guess I got really lucky all right.

On the flight, I talked with a teacher from Saskatoon, and left her with the message. When I arrived I had a feeling that I should go get a car from Budget. So I walked up to the desk, thinking maybe I'd get one of those neat Monte Carlos. But a countering thought came in and told me to ask for a ‘Cutlass' instead. So I did, and was told they didn't have one. I asked her to check again, and sure enough they did have one. But she said it was going back to Regina, and besides, it was reserved. Then she asked, "Is your name Pauls?"

Well, there it was. And you know, I hadn't reserved it.

When I left the airport with the car, I just drove around for a while. Then I asked out loud, "Why do I have this car?" And right away the answer came.

"There are two hitch-hikers just outside of town. Pick them up." Well, I countered that thought and asked again why I had the car. I could have taken the train, or the bus, or even flown to Regina, so why the car? And again I clearly got, "two hitch-hikers, just outside of town. You are to pick them up."

So I checked into a motel for the night and the next morning I left for Regina. Just as I took the turn-off to Regina, there on the side of the road were my two hitch-hikers, pack sacks and all, and right on schedule.

They told me they were hitching across the country from Vancouver. One of them was from Nakusp, in the interior of British Columbia, and the other said he was from Montreal. They said that they hadn't planned to come to Saskatoon, but a ride the day before brought them northeast to Saskatoon, rather than straight east to Regina.

"Well, I was supposed to pick you guys up," I said. And we talked all the way to Regina and I told them the story. When I came to the Trans Canada highway in Regina we shook hands and parted company. End of mission, I was told, turn in the car and fly home.

These trips were like training flights. Sometimes there were contacts to be made; sometimes it would be a dry run in order to rehearse a new move, so to speak. Like I was being trained to accept direction as I went along. To go on faith without the whole itinerary layed out.

One of these dry run trips took me to Prince George. In fact, I got only a couple of hours notice that I would be going, and I was blissfully unaware that I was heading into one of the busiest periods that Prince George had seen. I arrived right in the middle of the B.C. Winter Games when there are thousands of athletes there from all over the province. But that wasn't all. The federal Liberals were having a meeting of some sort there too and the Prime Minister and many of his cabinet colleagues were there. Now, add to that the corps from the media and you've got a pretty busy time.

When I got off the plane, I got a feeling to follow one group of people as they got on the airport bus. They got off at the Inn of the North, the major hotel there. So I joined the line up waiting to check in. As the line moved, I could hear people without reservations being turned away, told that the hotel was booked. I persisted anyway. After all, it wouldn't cost anything to ask for a room.

When it came to my turn I asked for a room and the reply came, ‘Do you have a reservation sir?" I said that I didn't, but instead of turning me away, she just looked at me for a moment, then walked back toward the office. After a few moments, she returned with a key and asked me to fill in the register. I had a room.

After I settled in, I came back to the lobby and it was even wilder than when I'd left it. And they were still turning away people, some of whom had reservations. It was rather an incredible scene, and into it all marched the Prime Minister's entourage complete with cabinet ministers, press corps and all their paraphernalia.

Despite all this high powered talent around me, I had no feeling to contact anyone. I was told that I was simply on a trip to learn not to doubt direction no matter how impossible the odds seemed. Anybody could have simply walked away from the line up after over hearing what I had about the lack of rooms. But I was shown that even the most apparently solid barriers can evaporate if something has to be accomplished. I was told that what I had to add to the mix was faith, that everything would work out.

Another question I had about it all concerned the reason for my being in the midst of the governing powers of the land, and nary a contact. The answer back was that, "What you were shown was the government of the past, the government that will have once been." In terms of what I was dealing with, it was the system of the old age. That in my terms it was no longer a power.

These guides of mine would go to some pretty startling lengths sometimes to keep me on track, despite what I wanted to do. It happened during one of those weekend, whirlwind trips around British Columbia.

I had taken the train, day coach, from Prince George to Terrace. Only the day coach ride was overnight so I didn't get much sleep on the trip. I arrived in Terrace early on a Sunday morning and decided I'd check into a hotel to catch a couple of hours sleep. Then I planned to take the evening flight back to Vancouver. I'd been traveling for a couple of days up to this point and I just wanted to get home.

Following that plan though, I thought I could do whatever it was I had to do in Terrace, then make it home that evening. I should have caught the clue when I tried to call the airline and book my flight, but I didn't. I called three times, and three times they answered. But each time they couldn't hear me. I just figured it was the phone system, because it worked on the next call I made to Vancouver, to Sharon, to tell her that I'd be home on the evening flight, about six.

Next I called my brother, Pete, who lives in Terrace and arranged to visit with him for the afternoon, and bring him up to date on what I'd been doing lately. Well, he picked me up after I'd had a few hours sleep, and we spent the afternoon talking about all of this stuff. Around four o'clock, I asked him to drive me to the airport. I told him about the problem with the phone and that I would just buy the ticket out there.

The plane was due to arrive at five o'clock. We got out there about ten after four, and after I got my ticket we spent the rest of the time talking. Just about the time the plane should have arrived, it was announced over the loudspeaker that because of a problem, the plane was unable to land at Terrace and had been directed over to Prince Rupert. The plan was, they announced, to bus everyone to Rupert where they could board the plane to Vancouver. That would add about three hours to the trip.

Just as the buses pulled up to the terminal I said to Pete, "I really feel bad about this. I feel like Jonah on that boat causing all that trouble for the other people because he wasn't where he was supposed to be. I think I'll cancel my flight. Change it over to tomorrow instead. I feel to blame for all of this." So I canceled my flight and Pete drove me back to his house for dinner. It was now about a quarter after five. At about five-thirty I called Sharon to tell her I wasn't coming. She told me that moments before my call she'd checked with the airline which told her that the flight would be delayed half an hour to forty-five minutes, that's all.

That's strange. So I told my brother, who then called the airport to find out what was going on. When he hung up he said, "Guess what, the plane is on the ground here, right now, loading up for Vancouver." They had told him that one of the navigation beacons they needed for an instrument approach had suddenly quit working at ten after four. Not only that, but just as abruptly, it had come back on again at five fifteen. It wasn't as if it had been fixed, because it was in a remote location up on a mountain somewhere. Since the beacon was working again they decided to bring the plane back rather that bus all the way to Rupert.

Well, you should have seen Pete's wife. She was astounded. She said, "Now I'll believe anything." After all, this sort of thing was what we'd been talking about all afternoon, and now it had come home.

I had my brother drive me back to the hotel and I checked in again. I just had the feeling that there were people to see. And staying at his house wouldn't facilitate that. And that's what happened. I made three connections that evening. Then the next day, I connected again on the flight home.

Here's how complex it gets. The flight the night before was a direct flight, Vancouver to Terrace and back to Vancouver. The flight I was now on made the more usual triangle route, Vancouver to Terrace to Prince Rupert, and then back to Vancouver. It was on the Prince Rupert leg that I connected with a businessman from that city. Talk about circles within circles within circles, eh?