To Ed for 15,348 days of friendship and counting, Geri without
whom my latter days would be without delight or challenge, the memory
of Elizabeth Koenig who went home in May 2012, and JBM.
_____Based on a True Story_____
The absurd plot into which I was unsuspectingly recruited, recounted
in "Stalking the Average Man," evolved into an intricate teaching scheme
that mystics of particular backgrounds call stalking. In this instance, the
term does not refer to the aberrant persecution of another‘s welfare. The
literal opposite is the case, as the stalker‘s goal is to free an apprentice
from their apparently reasonable behaviours, which cause unforeseen
harm to them down the road.
The process of raising their core beliefs, and subsequent poor
practices, from the unrealized to eye level is endlessly affronting because
the influential circumstances that generated them create a maze of self-
justification. O vercoming this requires that the teacher be cunning,
relentless, and ruthless in the dismantling of the student‘s safeguards to
self-discovery.
To this end, the teacher administers lessons according to rules known
only to them, which involve the student dealing with a seemingly
unpremeditated mixture of practical disciplines, peculiarly staged e vents,
and extraordinary cognitive experiences. As this approach appears to be
arbitrary, writing my story as it actually occurred would read like bullet
points in a blender. In addition, to avoid distracting the reader I did not
chronicle the multitude of tantrums to which I was prone. This has me
appear more mature and thoughtful than was the case.
_____Preamble_____
In the Spring of 1988, by arrangement I met a beautiful woman
whose interests lay in the design of destiny, miracles, and me—an average
looking man whose naiveté had been savaged while working for television
news organizations in places like San Salvador and Beirut. Not
surprisingly, our meeting was a pleasantly bizarre exchange of contrary
views, during which Bonnie dangled mystical intrigues from her novel- in-
progress to stimulate my stunted imagination, and secure my help adapting
it for the screen.
As the evening wore on, and my practised repartee nurtured her
intrigue in me, a romance between us became no less absurd an idea than
