As
the lights went out in the cavernous gym, he sat on a chair in the middle of
the gym floor. He sat next to a PA rack
system that he had hooked up to two large speakers. I could see his outline in the darkness, and
the lights blinking on the PA system. I
heard a key pressed on a cassette tape and the ‘hiss’ sound of well-worn analog
tape moving through the speaker system, violin music drifted in, a syrupy
introduction melody -- ghostly and staticky -- it had the sound of a tape
cassette that had been played many times. The music faded into silence, and
then I heard these words:
‘It was morning, and the new sun
sparkled gold across the ripples of a gentle sea. A mile from shore a fishing
boat chummed the water and the word for breakfast flock flashed through the air
till a crowd of a thousand seagulls came to dodge and fight for bits of
food. It was another busy day
beginning. But way off alone, out by
himself beyond boat and shore Jonathan Livingston Seagull was practicing...”
This was the first time that I had ever heard the story of
Jonathan Livingston Seagull[1]. In 1973, the same year that Mr. Frenz was
hired as the band director at Marlington High School, the book: Jonathan
Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach, was at the top of the New York Times
Bestseller list. It's easy to see now, why this book became such an important
part of our peculiar musical curriculum at Marlington. In so many ways, we were
all Jonathan Seagulls at different points in our lives.
For me at this time, the thing that had caught my attention about
this late-night 1973 recording by the Irish actor Richard Harris was not the
audio production itself. The audio rendition of this story is engaging, but
what really got into my mind and started moving around was the man who had
pressed the play button on the tape player -- the master of ceremonies on that
night, our band director, Mr. Frenz.
I couldn’t help but notice that even at that late hour, in the
darkness of that gymnasium, that he was still wearing his coat and tie -- he
was still on duty, so-to-speak. He
wanted us kids, more than 150 of us sprawled out on that ice-cold rock-hard gym
floor, to hear something important. I
understood from how he was dressed, and how he carried himself that class was still
in session. I knew instinctively that whatever
this recording was, it was important -- and I assumed that it was an extension
of everything that he was trying to teach us.
As I lay in the darkness on that gym floor, and the wispy and
glassy sound of a man’s voice -- a voice with a very faint accent -- told this
story about a seagull named Jonathan. As
I listened to the story, I heard about Jonathan, a loner, a misunderstood
dreamer, a bird filled with passion -- and I heard about how Jonathan let that
passion guide his life. In Jonathan, I
heard a lot about myself -- or at least the person deep inside me who wanted
to break free from his circumstances.
Through the wonders of flight, beautiful unhindered flight, Jonathan
Livingston Seagull learned that he could break free -- that the power for him
to soar beyond the heavens -- this power was inside him and it was unleashed by
love. Within this story, I could also hear the distinct personal message that we
are all spiritual beings -- not merely temporal -- but all of us have a spark
of divinity within us and one day, we will all break free from these bonds of
the earth and soar away.
Yes, this was a nighttime seminar in metaphysics -- and our
professor for this coursework was Mr. Frenz -- sitting alone in the middle of
the gym floor in the darkness and his class of students reclining in a circle
around him. He wanted us to think about these principles, and without ever
saying a word, he was able to instruct us very effectively in this advanced
cosmic coursework. This story of the
seagull -- as I understood it -- was not a separate teaching of what we were
learning in the Marlington Band Program.
The story of this seagull was an integrated component of
everything we were learning -- all of it being more than music. Listening to this beautiful narrative about a
lonely seagull helped me to further comprehend that true freedom belongs to
anyone willing to follow their hearts and follow their passion. Personally, this story of the seagull was
also a reminder of what I had learned in the Schwartz Center at St. Joseph’s
church years before that I was a spiritual being, more than my present
temporal circumstances.
“We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” This was what
Mr. Frenz would say to us frequently.[2] In different contexts, on different
occasions, and several times every year I would hear him say this – sometimes
in passing. Jonathan Livingston Seagull
would have agreed with him.
I drifted off to sleep on that gym floor in the mountains in West
Virginia, listening to this tale of the seagull. My mind and heart were filled with wonderful
things -- I was filled with my love for this music we were performing under
stadium lights. I was filled with a
sense of wonder about a spark within me that was kindling, that was growing,
that was beginning to fill my soul with warmth, with hope, with direction. We
were on the eve a significant victory for our musical program.
“I love that story.” A friend said it after we met for a few
minutes before breakfast.
“Yeah, it’s cool. It’s like a Bible story, but different.” I was
thinking about the gospels, but I knew there was something far more universal
in the story -- something closer to what we were experiencing in our lives
right then.
“They say he plays it at every major competition.”
“The same tape?” I asked.
“Yeah, exactly that same story, same setup and everything.”
“I guess if you want something to be remembered, you say it more
than once.”
“Yeah, but I like it. Just takes me away -- like I’m up there
flying with him.” And this was said with a smile and with an upward look like
her flight was possible, and imminent.
“The heaven stuff, kind of creeps me out.” I said and remembered
how much we had talked about God and religion on our bus ride up the night
before.
“I think it’s beautiful. The whole thing to me just feels like --
just God. I think it’s brilliant.”
A few of my band friends had talked to me about their ideas about
God, about religion, and the afterlife. These subjects, among countless others, are the topics of conversations on long bus trips among young people. I knew some who had such clarity about what
they believed, and I was envious of them. In particular, was Gretchen who had developed
at an early age a very distinct personal relationship with a strictly
monotheistic God that was omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient. Just God, no additions, no subtractions, all-natural. I admired her convictions.
My ideas about God, about my relationship to him were not that clear. At this time, I was still trying to get all the Apostles Creed, all of my Catechism, and Trinity, and Holy Spirit stuff all lined up into something that made sense to me. If my spiritual journey toward Unitarian Universalism had a starting point, it was there on that gym floor in the dark of night listening to a story about a lonely seagull.
I still don’t know if the story of Jonathan Livingston Seagull has a purely theological basis. The author himself is unsure. Maybe that was the lesson we were given all those years ago – that we were all having more than a physical journey in life – that we were having a spiritual journey also. This story about a seagull, if you listen to it, gets you thinking, and searching, and contemplating. We may all end up with different conclusions about what it all means, but the important part is that we struggled in the process to figure it out.
[1] Translated into more than
30 languages, Jonathan Livingston Seagull has sold more than 40 million copies
since 1970. Richard Bach received 18 rejections from separate publishers before
the first copy was ever printed.
[2] Mr. Frenz was quoting Teilhard de Chardin (1881 – 1951) a Jesuit
priest, paleontologist, and French philosopher -- who said “We are not
human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a
human experience.”
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