My Library

It had been wonderful. Puthoff was great. SRI was great. The unexpected results of the magnetometer experiment would circulate through the field and knock everyone off their pins. Willis Harmon and company, the Tillers, Shafica -- well, all these represented a world I wished I was qualified to enter and be an intimate part of. But I was not qualified, academically at any rate, and such qualifications were a full part of the SRI scene and the whole of Silicon Valley as well. The most I could be was the "psychic guinea pig," and which in the end was nothing or no one. Anyhow, I was used to Manhattan and its rapid transit systems, taxis, the opera, the museums, the multi-tiered social life. Silicon Valley stressed me, for when one was not sitting some place, one was sitting in a car going somewhere. Everything was at least 20 miles distant. On just about every street intersection was a Mobil gas station, a Taco Tico, a McDonald’s, and a bank. Therefore, all corners in Silicon Valley looked alike to me. And the California sun was too bright. Back within the familiar confines of Manhattan’s towering canyons, I unplugged my phone and slept an entire day. Then I called Zelda to say I hadn’t yet been reimbursed my airfare. My total capital at that moment was $10.28. I then telephoned Gertrude Schmeidler -- and then Janet Mitchell. Janet said something like: "What the fuck have you been up to? What’s this magnetometer stuff everyone’s talking about?" I made a date to have dinner with her and explain everything. My total, in-hand capital was $10 and some change. But I was FREE of that whole hellhole experience. I could rest on my laurels. I felt great.