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Now at that time I had developed a bad case of ball and socket disease.  This meant that the ball and socket in my left shoulder had gone all to hell.  The doctor said I had painted so much that the ball and socket had literally worn out.  He said the only solution was an operation to replace them.  The problem was that there was no guarantee that I would have full mobility, much less be able to paint at the same level that I had been.  For now he had me on heavy doses of ibuprofen because I was in constant pain.  It was a pulsing pain and I couldn't lift my arm beyond a certain height.  It hurt so bad the pain killers barely put a dent in it.  I learned to ignore it as much as possible to have some semblance of normalcy.  It hurt so bad I just wanted to sit down and cry like a little kid but I didn't.  I just took it and pretended it didn't hurt.  I had been suffering with this problem for several months and was really scared.  I didn't want the operation and kept putting it off even with the doctor pressuring me. This trip to New Mexico was a great distraction although I knew the problem was still with me.  I was just not going to think about it. 

 

 

I don't remember if it was spring or summer but the weather was beautiful and it was a a pleasant drive.  When we got there it was much smaller than I expected but far more beautiful.  More primitive.  Colonial yet Indio.  Simple.  We were expecting large tourist crowds but there were only a few people there which was nice.  Carlos pulled up and told me to get out and he'd pick me up in an hour.  He said he had other business and besides he hated the church and refused to go in one.  (That's another story for another time.)  So I was on my own.  I was terrified.  What do I do?  Do I genuflect?  Where do I find the dirt?  What do I do if I meet a priest?  Or another person?  It's a church for God's sake!  What do I do?! 

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“Just go in.” He said.  Then he drove away while I stood there in the parking lot looking stupid. 

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I went In. 

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The first thing I noticed was that as I entered there was a short foyer with a triangular architrave with an image in the middle.  That image stopped me cold.  All my nervousness left and was replaced with wonder.  You see, that was the image that once talked to me and told me what was going to happen in my life.  My heart pounded so hard I thought I might faint.  I stood there just staring.  Remembering. 

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In late 1969 I was living in a servants quarters in a large estate at around 44th and Kipling in Westminster.  I lived there with my friend Jim R. after our journey to Boston.  The estate belonged to Jim's dad and since we had no place to live he reluctantly let us live there.  I was working in a small cafe on North Federal and Jim was looking for a job.  (He was always looking for a job.)  In our little apartment was a two by three foot black and white poster that hung on the west wall.  The poster had originally hung on one of the tall speakers at the Family Dog and Jim said he stole it one night when no one was looking.  The Dog was a famous hippie hangout in the late sixties where all the best groups played before they got famous. Groups like the Doors, Janis Joplin, Hendrix, and many others.  To steal something from the Dog was a ballsy thing to do.  I doubt Jim stole it.  He was a notorious liar but nobody knew this except me.  I knew all his secrets.  He probably bought the poster in a head shop and told people he stole it for the status. 

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The poster was supposed to be a picture of some guru named Mustafa Baba.  I thought it looked like Jesus.  One day I came home from work and Jim and a couple of friends were tripping on some acid in Jim's room.  They were giggling and laughing so loud I could hear them through his closed door.  I smoked a joint and sat in a chair to unwind.  I was listening to some mellow music to drown out the noise from the bedroom.  As I sat there looking at Mustafa all of a sudden he started talking to me.  For some reason I didn't see anything wrong or weird about this and began talking to him.  It was mellow and pleasant.  He told me my life.  About what was, what is, and what is to be.  He told me my future but I didn't remember a single thing he said.  I don't know how long we talked and before I could think about what he said or to even realize what just happened, the door to the bedroom burst open.  Jim, Phil, and John were falling all over each other hooting and hollering and laughing their asses off.  They just had a collective hallucination together. 

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Jim had three posters in his room that were blowups of the covers of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy that was all the rage at that time.  As they were looking at the posters while they were tripping, the posters came alive and like a movie they watched it.  In their excitement I didn't think about my strange conversation with Mustafa until much later.  I didn't discuss it with anyone.  I didn't even remember it until that moment in the front of the church. 

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I learned much later that Mustafa Baba was the wrong name of the poster.  I never saw that name on the poster itself but because Jim said this was who it was, I just accepted it.  Years later I bought an album by a group called Andwella whose album was called World's End.  On the cover was Mustafa.  Or rather who I thought was Mustafa.  According to the cover it was Jesus and the painting it was from was called St. Veronica's Handkerchief.  That was all it said.  It was many years after that when my wife Arlette brought home an antique picture of Veronica's Handkerchief from a second hand store.  The painting was done by a man named Gabriel Max who was born in 1840 in Austria.  The painting still exists and is in Prague Austria.  In America the work was known as the Last Token.  I didn't know this last bit of information when I was standing in the front of the church looking at an image that made me feel like it was there only for me. 

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I still wonder if the image I saw was the image I thought I saw.  I mean was it really Mustafa Baba and for some reason became the image of Jesus.  Otherwise why did Jim insist it was Mustafa?  When I saw the image on the cover of Andwella's album, I immediately recognized it as the poster that talked to me.  Both of those images were in black and white but the one in the church was in sepia with a greyish yellow background color.  I gathered these were the original colors of the painting.  The painting had become famous because when you looked at the piece, Jesus's eyes are closed.  As you continued to look at it, the eyes open.  It freaks people out and it works on almost all who see the work.  The image on the church was in the middle of the triangular architrave surrounded by strips of bark cut from trees.  The bark covered the entire interior of the architrave forming a frame around Jesus's face.  The bark surrounding his face conveyed a rustic earthy feel.  A sense of humility.  I felt like he was waiting for me. 

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I went into the church.  It was small and very primitive looking. Old. The wall behind the altar was adorned painted wood carvings that were in the Santero style and obviously very old.  Perhaps hundreds of years.  I was moved by the simple humble beauty of the place.  At the front on the left side of the altar in front of the first row of pews was a door.  I was told to go through that door to the room where the dirt was.  I slowly made my way down to the front.  I was still nervous.  When I went through that door I was stunned at what I beheld.  It was a long narrow room about ten feet wide and was the length of the church.  At the back end there was another door that led into a tiny room.  The long room was filled from front to back with stacks of wheelchairs, crutches, and canes piled everywhere.  There were letters, plaques, pictures and many other gifts of gratitude.  All these things had born witness to countless miracles that this humble room had witnessed.  I could feel my heart swell.  I was overwhelmed with emotion to know it was real.  These things would not be here if it wasn't.  I wandered through the room touching, reading and feeling.  I looked over at the door at the end of the room and started walking toward it with soaring reverence. 

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When I entered the tiny room, it had several people in it waiting in line with bags and jars to get some of the dirt.  In the middle of that room was a small well made of stones and concrete.  It was about three feet in diameter.  Inside of the little well was red sandy dirt.  One by one the people dug into the dirt and filled sacks and jars in what I thought were rather large amounts.  When I got my turn I just had two little sandwich bags.  I filled one about half way for Carlota and the other about a quarter of the way for myself.  There was a little altar at the front of the well where you could get on your knees to make a little prayer and leave a donation if you wanted.  I wanted to do just that but I was so nervous about not being Catholic and not knowing all the rules like crossing myself and such.  I just quietly said thank you and left.  When I got out Carlos was in the parking lot waiting for me. 

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I jumped into the car and immediately went into detail of my amazing adventure, not knowing that the most amazing thing had yet to happen.  I took out the bags to show them to Carlos when I wondered if this dirt might work on me.  So as a goof I opened the bag I had got for myself and took some of the soil out and rubbed it on my shoulder.  I opened my shirt and rubbed it directly on my skin.  I did it without any expectations of any effect.  My shoulder at that particular moment was pulsing in pain. 

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The second the dirt touched my skin the pain stopped.  It shut off like switching off a light.  Instantly.  I was stunned.  It was the first time I was not in pain in almost a year.  I was filled with joy.  A miracle! A miracle!  I jumped up and down in Carlos's car or rather as much as you can jump up and down in the front seat of a car going down the highway.  I was laughing and praising God in joyous ecstasy.  For thirty minutes or more I carried on.  Then I made a huge mistake.  I calmed down and looked at Carlos and asked, “After all these years that people have been taking dirt out of that spot how come there is still dirt in that hole?” 

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“They fill it every morning.”  Carlos said. 

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BAM!  The pain instantly came back. 

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Afterword 

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When I took Carlota the dirt I got her at the Santuario, I told her what happened.  She told me it wasn't the spot in the church that was a holy spot but the dirt itself.  “You see,” she said, “There is a little spot near the river that runs behind the church.  It's as if God put his thumb print on that spot and ever since the dirt from that spot has healing powers for those of faith.  The Indians used that dirt for centuries before the Spanish came.  That's why they built the church there in the first place.  So when they put new dirt in the well in the church they get it from that spot on the river.   The river always makes sure there is always dirt at that spot.  It's been that way forever.” 

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The last question I had was why did it work on me if only for a short time?  I now believe that faith is not what you believe but rather is a state of mind.  A state of being.  When I rubbed the dirt on my shoulder I expected nothing.  But faith came into play in the act itself.  When I rubbed on the dirt it was an act of faith although I didn't know it.  When I saw all the crutches and wheelchairs I subconsciously knew that this was a miraculous sacred place.  I could just feel it.   So when I rubbed the dirt on my shoulder, it was an act of faith without my realizing it was because I thought faith required belief.  It doesn't. 

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P.S. For those who are curious about the state of my shoulder, in 1992 I saw a little 84 year old Mystic chiropractor who did her healing work on my shoulder and fixed it up for a painting.  I haven't had any problems with it since.