LETTER FROM APPALACHIA
from the Archives of the

Psychiatry Division
Konnarock Medical Center
60354 Hassinger Road
Damascus, Virginia 24236
Open - Closes 5PM - (276) 484-8109

February 7, 2020

I went to bed at 1:30 a.m., 
tossed and turned for an hour, fell asleep at 2:30, 
slept soundly until 7:30 a.m. when I woke annoyed with pruritus 
caused by intertrigo between the 2nd and 3rd right toes. 
I rolled to the edge of the bed, 
grasped the shoulders of my aluminum walker and succeeded, just barely,
getting to my feet in the vertical position, 
shuffled over toward the window,
lowered myself into the armchair next to the table, 
inserted the right contact lens which I had removed the night before, 
anointed with 1% tolnaftate, the skin fold now inexorably itching
from intertriginous dermatitis, 
slipped first the left foot into the left trouser leg, 
then the right foot into the right trouser leg,
put on my velcro-laced shoes, 
and then the dirty old black winter jacket I have been wearing. 
I lowered the venetian blind against the rising sun, 
calculated that where the night before, I had managed on 4 hours sleep, 
the 5 hours from which I had just awakened would seem to be a luxury, 
then flipped open the laptop, turned it on and started, 
as I do each morning, to try to write down nothing more or less
than what was on my mind. 

I realized then that it had been 
not the tinea pedis itch between the toes 
which had awakened me, 
but a dream,
a dream which became more vivid the more I thought about it,
and which demanded to be typed into the smudgy keyboard. 

63 years is a long time. 
It was a few weeks after I had opened my Damascus ophthalmology practice. 
When I told Mutti that there would be an Ascension Day revival 
at the local Baptist Church that Sunday, 
an announcement to which she replied:
"Da muss unsre ganze Familie, gemeinsam geschlossen, erscheinen.
Wir können die Leute nicht vor den Kopf stoßen." 
It wasn't worth a family argument, 
so I agreed to take the Red Car from the Knoll 
and to leave it in the Church Parking Lot, 
where it would be available after the church service 
for Klemens to drive the family up to Konnarock. 
I knew the parking lot would be very crowded, 
but I thought that if I explained to the attendant 
that Louise Hall was my father's patient, 
he would be sympathetic and find a place for me to park.

But it wasn't that simple. 
I was a little shocked that when I pulled into the lot, 
the attendant, whom I recognized as Wilmer Walls, 
was wearing a black uniform decorated 
with the frightening Waffen-SS insignia, 
but then I reminded myself about the last time
I had written about a man wearing that fateful symbol,
and about what Albert had said to Döhring 
that early summer evening among the vestigial ruins of Bankhead:
"In ihrem Fach, sollte ich meinen, gilt es doch als eine Binsenwahrheit, 
dass das Äußere nicht das Innere ist," to which Döhring had protested: 
"Aber man kann das Innere doch nur über das Äußere erkennen," 
leading Albert to the definitive conclusion:
 "Man kann das Innere überhaupt nicht kennen." 

As I had feared, the attendant would not let me park. The lot is full,
he said. "But Louise Hall is a patient of my father's," I protested.
That doesn't matter, there's not a single space in the lot, 
except the one we're holding for Jesus.
"I'll take that. It's good enough for me." 
No sooner had I said it than I realized my mistake. 
It's been Virginia law that all church officials and employees,
moreover, since last February, all church goers,
must carry a concealed weapon. 
I knew that the attendant would pull out his gun
to defend Jesus' right to the parking space, 
and that would be the end of me.
But that's not what happened.
Instead of shooting me,
The attendant looked at me and said.
"Do you know Jesus? Sometimes I think he isn't real."
That was my opportunity. It was now or never.
"Yea, I think he's for real," I said. 
"I talk to him on the 'phone every day."
"You what?" the attendant gasped. 
His jaw dropped so low I thought it might become unhinged.
"I talk to him on the phone every day," I repeated, "or almost every day.
I have a smartphone for which they sold me their Jesus app. 
I press a button and Saint Peter picks it up at the other end. 
Saint Pete understands that Jesus enjoys talking with me, 
so he almost always puts him on right away."
"Well, what does Jesus say?" the parking lot attendant in the SS uniform
inquired. "There's  problem," I said. 
"What do you mean, There's a problem,"
the parking lot attendant asked, and I thought I saw him reach 
into an inside pocket for a gun."
"It's not Jesus," I hastened to explain. "Jesus would love
to have me tell you what he says." "Well, if it's not Jesus, 
if Jesus wouldn't care, why don't you tell me?"
"It's Verizon," I said to the incredulous parking lot attendant. 
"It's Verizon's Ultimate, the most expensive connection they have, 
and they won't connect you unless
you sign a non-disclosure agreement."
"A what?" the attendant asked.
"An agreement that the subscriber promises not to reveal 
any conversation between Jesus and them, 
and its mostly the girls, each one of whom thinks 
that Jesus is in love with her, that thinks she's the only one, 
and it's the same message for every girl, 
no matter how old, how fat, how ugly and - 
don't tell anyone hereabouts - how black. 
As a matter of fact, the voice of Jesus is not from a human being, 
it's a computer generated message supposedly from Jesus that Verizon 
is making millions of dollars off. Like everything else in this world,
it's a fraud."
"That's all too complicated for me," said the parking lot attendant 
whom my confidences had made somewhat more obliging. 
"Straight ahead, just to the left is the only remaining parking space, 
which we left for Jesus.
The space is wide, unless Jesus comes in an SUV, 
which I don't think he will,
there's space for two cars, if you bear to the right." 
Perhaps it was a mistake when, in response, I said, 
"Just yesterday, Jesus told be he's coming by public transportation."
"You mean that's what the computer generated message told you," 
said the attendant who now seemed much more alert. 
"No, Saint Pete always connects me straight with Jesus hisself," 
I said deliberately lapsing into the local vernacular. 
"Oh, one more thing, said the attendant. As soon as you're parked, 
I'll send one of Billy Hagy's boys to disconnect the distributor."
"You'll do what?" I asked. 
"I'll send one of Billy Hagy's boys to disconnect the distributor. 
There's a charge for that, you know." 
"I don't get it. What's that all about?"
"Well Billy Hagy, the one who's on the church council 
and runs the automobile repair shop, 
he's an expert, says its too dangerous 
for a car to be parked with the distributor connected. 
The engine might start, 
the car might shoot off 
and someone might get killed."
"Isn't that what concealed weapons are all about?"
I interjected fatuously, on the spur of the moment.
But the attendant, intent on delivering the information,
ignored me, and continued:
"So there's a rule that everyone who parks in this here lot 
has to have the distributor cable pulled."
"Now really," I said, looking the attendant straight in the eye.  
Since he had backed off and let me use the parking space assigned to Jesus, 
I was no longer intimidated by him. 
"Look," I said, "I'm a DIY, that means do it yourself, and 
if there's a cable to be pulled on this car, 
I can do it myself without help."
And with that assertion, 
I started the engine and moved the car, very slowly 
so as not to scratch anything else, 
to Jesus' parking space, 
got out of my Red Car, and opened the hood, 
making sure the attendant understood that I meant business. 
He was walking over to check on me. 
Slowly, I could see that he was limping.  
I had been confident that I would have no trouble finding
the distributor and disconnecting the cable to the coil. 
Now, to my embarrassment, 
I couldn't see either the cable or the distributor, 
and the attendant was standing next to me, 
peering over my shoulder into the opened engine compartment
to see how I was getting along.
On my part it was an act of desperation. 
I had no idea what I was doing.
Finally I saw the cable connecting 
the negative pole of the battery to the chassis, 
and with several tugs almost powerful enough to break the battery case, 
I yanked at the cable, 
all the while pretending to know exactly what I was doing, 
until finally the clamp slid off the leaden post. 
"OK," I said, "I've done it,
and done it exactly how the Lord Jesus told me to do it."
"But that's not how Billy Hagy said it ought to be done."
"Now, listen," I said," 
so long as that cable isn't touching the battery, 
this car won't start, 
even if Jesus is in the driver's seat turning the key."
The attendant had no rejoinder, but he was in an argumentative mood. 
"Did Jesus tell you what kind of car he was driving."
"He's coming by public transportation, that's what he told me."
"Then how's he going to get to the launching pad?"
"He told me he would just walk, on foot."
"He couldn't possibly do that. 
It's nine miles up Route 58 to Bear Tree Gap.
If he tried to walk that, he'd never get launched. 
He'd be much too tired to get off the ground."
"He's not launching from Bear Tree Gap."
"Oh yes, he is. 
The Bear Tree Gap Rod and Gun Club has set up a launching pad 
about 200 feet off the south side of the Gap."
"Those plans have changed. Jesus told me this morning, 
he's decided to launch from the head of Mock Hollow, 
and that's nearby so he can walk there. 
The original plan was that Jesus would first go into orbit 
from the summit of White Top 
and then jet into outer space and to heaven, 
but even though, ever since we got here from Germany,
John Blakemore has generously let my family drive up
on White Top for free,
in Jesus' case, John Blakemore wouldn't hear of it. 
He demanded a hefty fee for the launch.
I could never figure out why.
Jesus taking off from Lover's Leap or from Buzzards Rock
would have generated twice as much publicity for 
White Top Mountain in Virginia as Eleanor ever did."
"Who's Eleanor?" the attendant asked.
"Eleanor," I explained, relieved finally to have stumbled
on a non-controversial subject, "was the wife of FDR,
that's Franklin Delano Roosevelt."
The attendant was not impressed.
"If that guy was as fat as his name, what'd he have for breakfast?"
I ignored the attendant's insult to the great President.
"Eleanor Roosevelt attended the 1934 White Top Mountain Festival 
where Wilhelm Furtwängler conducted the Belmont Festival Orchestra
in all six Brandenburg Concertos, the Christmas Oratorio
and Beethoven's Fifth Symphony." "You don't say!" the attendant
said, and I couldn't tell, whether he understood the greatness
of the music. But I never found out, because he changed the subject.
"I bet John Blakemore is even now roasting in Hell, because he wouldn't
give Jesus a free pass to take off from the top of White Top."

Es ist heute nicht mehr feststellbar, welcher von den beiden, der schläfrige,
sich im Vorsterben befindende Möchtegern Philosoph und Dichter, oder der
anspruchslose und doch gerissene Kirchenparkplatzanwärter diese Frage gestellt
hatte. 

Today it can no longer be determined which of the two, the drowsy,
crippled premoribund wanabee philosopher, novelist and lyric poet or the 
undemanding and yet in his own way astute church parkinglot attendant had
uttered these words because they were stifled or drowned or blown away by
an entirely unexpected event, an explosion precipitating a thunder so loud
it could not be heard, a flashing of light so bright it could not be seen, 
a wave of pressure so strong it could not be felt. Whatever it was, had 
caused the door of the Red Minivan to slide open, sucking the parking lot 
attendant and his client into the vehicle's empty cavernous cargospace; 
where the two fortuitous survivors now cowered, fearful if one embraced 
the other, each might discover not only that his counterpart was dead, 
but that he himself was no longer a resident in the land of the living.

How much time elapsed before they began to speak 
can now no longer be assessed.
Finally it was the attendant who broke the silence. 
"Was this the Big Bang?" the attendant asked. 
"It sounded like it, but it couldn't have been, 
because the Big Bang occurred at the beginning of time, 
while what we just survived was an end of something 
and perhaps close to the end of everything."
Meanwhile the destruction continued. 
It appeared that the modest First Baptist Church of Damascus VA had changed, 
mutated, transformed itself, metamorphosed into a veritable volcano 
which continued to spew not only smoke and flames, 
but also human bodies, arms, legs, feet, thighs, bellies and chests 
through the decapitated apex of its spire.

Meanwhile sirens had started to howl in all parts of the little town,
not only at the fire station and at the police station, 
but at the bank, at the Post Office on Reynolds Street, 
at the Old Mill on the stream where it was about 
to turn into the South Fork of the Holston River, 
at the American Cyanamid Dye Plant in the Extract 
and across South Shady Avenue at Herbert Wrights knitting mill. 
In the occasional intervals of partial silence 
between the screaming of the local sirens, 
one heard penetrating the clefts of the mountains, 
alarms from far distant locations, 
from Back Bone Rock and Sutherland and Shady Valley, 
from Konnarock, Troutdale, Green Cove and White Top City, 
from Alvarado and as far away as Abingdon. 
And then the emergency vehicles began to converge on the
First Baptist Church in Damascus parking lot, 
not only Herbert Wright's two black hearses, 
not only the sole local fire truck, 
the local sheriff and his two deputies, 
not only entire divisions of the the Virginia State Police, 
but rescue squads from everywhere, or so it seemed. 
The police at the scene radioed for tow trucks to clear the parking lot, 
so that ambulances and hearses could get access to the dead and the dying, 
and the tow trucks came in such numbers 
that the streets were clogged and nothing could get through. 

Meanwhile the parking lot attendant and I, 
having survived the volcanic eruptions 
of the First Baptist Church of Damascus VA
were confronted with the next risk, 
that of the car's being towed,
and more critically, being damaged and rendered inoperable.

By now the volcanic eruption had long since ceased, 
but black smoke continued to stream,
continued to pour out of the truncated steeple. 
Flames were no longer visible, and bodies, even parts thereof, 
had ceased to fall from the sky,
when I mentioned to my parking lot attendant companion
my concern about the car's being towed.
Without a word, he started to look for something to write on,
and found an old piece of stationery imprinted
at its lower edge with the name of my long deceased uncle, 
Frederick J. Meyer, Certified Public Accountant,
1781 Riverside Drive, New York City.
He found also a black felt tipped pen and
used this to print on the accountant's stationery
in large ungainly but unmistakably legible letters: 
This vehicle is reserved for JESUS CHRIST, and 
then he placed the notice on the dashboard under the windshield. 
"Do you think they will pay any attention to this" I asked. 
"Of course they will," said the attendant. 
"In this part of the woods," he continued, 
"you ignore Jesus Christ at your own risk." 
But only a short time thereafter, 
we felt the gentle nudge of the tow truck, 
which had soon lifted the front end of the Red Minivan 
to a 45 degree angle to pull it onto its tilted flatbed truck,
throwing the attendant and myself 
into an uncouth pile of squirming arms and legs.

It required some effort by each of us, to get back on our feet, 
but the parking lot attendant seemed,
in addition to recovering physical balance, to have straightened out morally,
because when both he and I were finally sitting comfortably supported
by the Minivans tilting but securely locked tailgate, 
the parking lot attendant said to me.
"I suppose I owe you an apology, 
because I entertained you with such brazen lies. 
Nobody hereabouts, none of us, believes in Jesus, 
because none of us has any idea what religion is; 
but whoever admits the truth and says he doesn't believe, gets executed,
gets shot to death on the spot. That's why we all carry concealed guns.
And the story about an ascension day revival is also a hoax. 
All these cars that are being towed from the parking lot 
belong to members of the Bear Tree Gap Rod and Gun Club, 
who were planning a military assault on the Abingdon Court House next month. 
And this church is really an armory,
where the basement is packed with explosives and ammunition. 
And that's what you just heard and saw blow up."

The loud explosions which the attendant and I had just survived 
were of course very bad. They were terrible. 
And terrible also, if in a different way, was the pervasive mendacity 
to which the attendant had just confessed. 
And while I was reflecting on the enormity of the mendacity 
I had just uncovered, it occurred to me, 
that I also had been telling lies about my Verizon Ultimate app 
and my regular telephone conversations with Jesus which the attendant,
non-believer that he turned out to be, must have known were lies,
unless, unless he received me as the evangelist missionary about to
convert him to ... well, to the true Love of Jesus.
Once more I felt the shivers run up and down my spine 
There was cold sweat on the palms of my hands.
Wouldn't it been just as well if the attendant had shot me at the very
beginning, when I said Jesus' parking space was good enough for me.
I looked out of the corner of my eye
whether he was even now reaching for his concealed weapon.
But if so, there would be nothing that I could do about it. 
I understood now what it means that you're damned if you do
and you're damned if you don't.
They shoot you for telling the truth
if you say you don't believe in Jesus,
and if you say you believe in Jesus, 
they shoot you for not telling the truth. 
The parking lot attendant seemed to have an inkling 
of my fears and feelings, and as he spoke his voice seemed much gentler 
than I remembered it. "Don't worry, I'm not going to shoot you because
you lied to me about that smartphone app, about your contacts with St Pete
and your conversations with Jesus. I knew you were lying, and I like you
for it. Let me compliment you. You're one of the best liars I ever listened
to, and I'm proud that you're one of us.
"So what happens next?" I asked. 
"Oh, the explosion will set us back a few weeks or at most a few months.
But we're not going to give up. We're going to make America great again."