THE TRIQUETRA OF LIFE: Wisdom, Wealth, and Wellness

An Excerpt from Chapter Twenty-Six

Path Perilous: My Search for God and the Miraculous

Winter, 1967, age 25

I did not yet understand what it meant to manifest Christ’s presence. I only knew that once I let go of material prompts, the world closed in—colder, sharper, less forgiving. Cold and hunger were no longer abstractions. That winter in Boston, with its wind-driven snow and ice-slick cobbled streets, instructed me in ways no sermon ever had—through sandaled feet, penniless pockets, and pain brought near without ceremony.

Christmas was my day off in Beacon Hill. Famished without the lunch usually provided at work, I trudged along a snow-filled side road off Charles Street, my stomach hollow and hurting. Through plate-glass windows, I saw a buffet restaurant sunk below sidewalk level. Uniformed servers in tall white hats and aprons stood behind a long spread, feeding a line of well-to-do customers. Their plates were heaped with roast beef, ham, and turkey—sweetened yams, cranberries, pecan pies.

The glass was fogged. I could see the rich, though they could not see me, as if nature itself had quietly accommodated their preference not to notice the poor. Just as well … I lacked the grooming and tailored clothing to pass among them.

Standing there in the snow, my sandaled feet numb and burning, warm air leaked out each time the door opened, brushed my face, then vanished. A man and his lady arrived, stepped around me, and stared a long moment. Inside, a server scraped hardly touched meat from a plate into a bin. My eyes tore from that wasteful sight, hunger gnawing at me in body and soul.

From the memoir-in-progress, nearing publication:
Path Perilous: My Search for God and the Miraculous
—a spiritual epic for truth-seekers, contemplative mystics, and all who long for God.

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