The Starfisher

by Christopher F. Mills

Overview

Forty and burned-out, Fall drives his Nash Rambler on a thousand-mile trip to see the ocean. On the way he detours through mountain country. On a rural road he meets a woman with Indian summer eyes, and mystery and dream are soon remembered.

When they were young they had shared a dream. But he buried that dream, with her, long ago. It was a once upon a time dream. Then once upon a time ended and left one dreamer alone. But the end of life and once-upon-a-times need not be the end of dreams. The dreamer and the dream may die, but the dream of life must go on. And promises made are sacred things.

The Starfisher is a special-delivery message by which you may become reacquainted with your own original starlight. To discover that place, would a trillion-mile trip be too long?

Product Details

BN ID:	2940045681506
Publisher:	Christopher F. Mills
Publication date:	01/21/2014
Sold by:	Smashwords
Format:	eBook
File size:	317 KB

About the Author

The Moving Map

Start your mental movie-reel and go on a last flight in a B-17 bomber in an heroic battle of WW2 that has finally, after six decades, been de-classified. Stand with Pappy against six angry Russians and when it's over, you and Pappy be the last ones standing. Stand beside Johny against The World, and when that's over, you and Johny slap the giant awake, as promised. Fall in love with Chauncey and Claire, and stay that way through-out the centuries, from the Middle Ages to the Space Age. Through unknown, countless lifetimes, know what it means to love just one soul and one heart. Wayfare through the forest with a silver-bearded sage. Is he spirit in the flesh? Is he God? Or is he a figment of your imagination. Whatever and whoever he is, he is patient and wise, and will effortlessly lead you back to yourself. After your walk with him, the miracle and mystery of life will be revealed.
Wayfare through the cosmos on a string of starlight. Drip down to earth on a bead of moonlight and fall on a lily pad in a lover's pond, and watch The Blue Moon Prince as he pines on the shore for his lost love. Fly through the air in a 1979 (give or take) Ford Station Wagon, as Crispy the Great is taken on a ride to hell alongside a possessed 14-year old. Time is running out for you to figure something out. It's All Hallow's Eve, and this boy has just been possessed by a cigarette-smoking, brownie-eating, hell-spawn. Hop a ride on a rocket to the moon with a frog who believes the impossible is the possible. Plant countless seeds, over half a century's time, in the hope that Christmas trees will grow, and just when you are ready to give up, something magical will happen.

Skate on a frozen pond with Rose and Galen and know what the Christmas spirit, and love, really is. Walk that quiet, snake-infested hall with Beaumont, all beady eyes on you, and know what it feels like to be handed a fame you never asked for, and never deserved. Listen in on the last lecture of the great Harvard professor Magnum C. Laudus, as he expounds on the theory that explains everything. And then go to the oldest tavern in New England and drink some beer and listen as Charlemagne, a double-genius himself, expounds on the professor's theory concerning the work-a-day world. Travel, in a modern world, to the most ancient city on earth and learn from Astrobolis the Twelve Precedents to Treasure, and then write your own twelve. Go with the planet's first trillionaire as he makes his first million by the age of eighteen. It's not that hard, really; it just takes brass balls, a little imagination, a Big-ass Mirror and a marching band.

Go on a ride with The Dreamer and Dream Girl; sit in the backseat as they hitch their Studebaker to a star and race, pell-mell, after an alien space craft. As you bump over Farmer Love's cotton rows, be sure to keep the spacecraft in sight. And Juju Road is coming up quick, so watch that trick door. Later on, run with Johny Beaumont after the starlight Indian, through the deep pines on Megas Jesse Mountain. And know that if you can catch the Indian, you will discover the fabled falls, and the secret that awaits you there. Be careful with Gabe; he is a special soul. Not many of us are like him. After the fabled falls, The World will come looking for you. If you can stand up to him like Johny did, count yourself a lion among men. Race your '69 Ford Boss Mustang against Levi's Plymouth Barracuda and after that, just keep running to catch the daylight, before it slips over. In the end, you will be given a difficult choice. What you decide will be the measure of you.

Gallop across the Field of Wonders on Stardust and Twelve Bolides with the one you love, and race to win; but don't worry overmuch which of you comes in first. Sit on a swing and watch a sea of leaves swirl around you, as fall comes in and takes away the love that it also brings. The seasons do work in mysterious ways, as you know. Stand on stage and give a speech to the people about freedom and independence. Be a founding father and founding mother of your own age; for what age is greater than the one happening now? What time ever needed true leaders more than this present age? Go on a trip with the essence of life itself, as it moves through time, space and being, and finally finds itself in the heart of a woman who has reached the Second Age of the Redbird and must rediscover in herself the miracle and wonder she knew so well when she was young. Men, too, have this first and second age in them. We are, after all, not any different from each other, except in the impermanent parts of our flesh.

one basic message:
Life is beautiful, and it is only love which makes it so. Nothing is impossible to one who truly believes and a human being is made great only by works of love. If there is no love in it, it is just sensationalism. Our world is very sensational. Maybe too much. But maybe a new age of man will begin now in parts, here and there; an age of man that better fits the highest ideals of what it is to be human.

Welcome to Smashwords, the best store on the net to discover your favorite new eBook. You are on the author profile of Christopher F. Mills. His time to ponder and to write was from 1989 to 2014, with most of the final writing seen here coming in the years 2010-2013. He is the founder and traveling dean of Forest Mills University, a fully-accredited-by-nature establishment founded on June 1, 1990 and dedicated exclusively to the liberal arts of truth, beauty and all higher thought. The campus of Forest Mills University resides in the towering minds of the pine tree line, the heart of the ancient redwood and the souls of the maple, oak and magnolia. The calls to spring are each year's opening course of instruction. If you see a hawk flying in circles, that is Forest Mills University in flight. A full moon rising through a deep forest and the sun slipping the horizon, these are classrooms. A still blue pond at the bottom of a great mountain; a rushing waterfall off the side of a big hill; a sky bedecked with crystal clear stars, these are Forest Mills University. A blue barn and a galloping horse, these are classrooms. Wherever there is nature unspoiled and unsoiled by the blight of man, there is Forest Mills University. It is a natural philosopher's university and nature the instructor. Here we learn at our own pace, and the best learning, and that which needs to be learned the best, is learned slow and over many years.

Any who begin life in the clouds of idealism, if they stay in the false society of man too long, will necessarily have to fall, eventually, among the ruins of proper society, their idealism spent. This is the natural course that comes of man-made law. One may say that at least they once flew among the clouds, for most never go there at all; most never had wings. The Mills course in natural philosophy may bring one who has fallen to rise again; may give one wings who has never flown before.

Christopher F. Mills wrote for the wise and those who would be so; he wrote for the beautiful and those who would be so; he wrote for the good and the noble, and those who would be so; he wrote for the mindful. He wrote for truth, for who else will or does? Very few, in truth. He wrote for love, for who else will? He did not write for the riff-raff and the dibble-dabblers. He did not write for the ignorant, the prejudiced, the spiritually-jaundiced, the retrogressive and the power-mongers. He did write against these. He wrote a natural philosophy born from living a natural life He wrote from a solitary stance, without the bondage of false friends or high position to harass his pursuit of truth and beauty. He wrote from a secret knowledge concerning the human race, of which he was no established part of, except by accidental birth. He wrote for the philosopher, from a place of solitary aloneness and aloofness. He wrote to bring back to life those who have lost their grip on life.

All of his works equal a one-year beginner's course in natural philosophy that if followed, could re-invent ones psychological and spiritual outlook on life. His works have the power to bring the lost back to found; to bring one hand-to-hand with wonder and the miracle of life. This being a course load one may read in a year means that, by the end of that year, they may then begin to live their own philosophy, starting from the inspiration given them by the Mills Canon, if inspiration is within them. The best way to read his works is within one calendar year, each season its own successive course work. To enroll at Forest Mills University is to lead one's life back to a natural style of living.

The freshman beginning the Forest Mills University Course on Natural Philosophy should commence the spring with The Theory of the Ironic, The Crispy the Great Stories, Claire Capture and Prom Night '88; and throw in The Immortal Rocket Frog of Wallops Island. Let us begin in laughter, introductions and turning serious things on their silly little heads. The sophomore will progress into summer with How to Become Famous in High School, The Damascus Oil Lamp, The Old Man in the Moon and I, Too, am a Statesman. In the autumn the Junior level course-worker will peruse The Christmas Wish, The Starfisher, and The Five Lights of Morning By winter's end the Senior-level courser will have interpreted Johny Beaumont Stars in Godhead Leading, The Autobiography of A.C. Braithewaite, and last and greatest of all: The Gemstone. Read The Gemstone three times to begin to understand it, then read it three more times to know it. These are the course materials the new philosopher will use to begin their journey toward becoming a natural philosopher. Many will try it; few are made to truly accomplish it. If the world had too many true philosophers, there would not be enough fools to make a philosopher the rarest thing in the world. And that would upset the spin of the planet. But if you do make it, and pass, then you will be a fully-budded philosopher and what may bloom from that is up to the philosopher. In one calendar year you may become a Forest Mills University graduate and budding philosopher and the riches that may bring are incalculable. A graduate course and doctorate in natural philosophy will become available at Forest Mills University by 2015.

Maybe they will someday write of you:
“S/he was the planet's greatest literary and philosophical writer/liver. Their life was one of those possible/impossible stories, fantastical in its design, ambitious in its scope, and downright impracticable, for the most part.”

While it may, or may not, be true that Christopher F. Mills is, today, the most downloaded, best-selling author in the history of planet earth, deeper truth is that it all began very slow and long ago. From a quarter-century of constant labor and deep thought, coupled with writing millions of words in practice . . came the Mills Cannon, which blasted off like a supersonic stellar rocket, his sales figures soon heading beyond the lunar satellite and out into the galaxy, leaving all former earthly records, and record-makers, in stellar dust.

Long ago, he was asked by a petty-nosy-parker-busy-body-simpleton what he wished to accomplish by his writing. He replied:
“I am on a campaign for the world's greatest public office of Mankind's Favorite Author. I will write the words that will make for the joyful, tearful smiles and profound contemplation that will describe best the universe's rarest-known miracle: Human Life. I hope to help the race of man by making a record of the human condition. In this dream, I acknowledge no master as unapproachable and no creation out of reach. I set my end among the brightest star and strain to orbit it. I dream of impossible things. I, too, will write sonnets coequal with Shakespeare (and all the theatre players who helped him with that). I, too, will write lyrics as balanced—yet precarious in their airy delights—as the English Romantics. I, too, will pen prose as sober and tight as Hemingway. I, too, will write as original as Faulkner; I, too, will fashion humor and wit not unlike Mark Twain and in time our stories will be twined among the starry sphere with that comet of his, and the one coming for me. I will seek to equal that Concord sage who wrote the biography of sublimity. I will seek to become the most eclectic virtuoso of the age, and if I fail, it won't be for lack of trying, nor believing. What is the life of a man good for, if it does not seek some impossible thing? We are not rocks. We are men. And among the universe that achievement is, if not unheard of, something to be reckoned with. With my life I will do my best to prove the highest ideal of a man; with my writing I will seek to make a record of the highest ideals of all men. To fail at both makes giving up impossible. Each new day will be a chance for revision. I will rest when I reach perfection.”

Years passed. The questioner visited the author and found him asleep in the middle of the day. The simpleton asked,
“You are procrastinating. Get up and do something!”

Mills rolled over in bed and said,

“I finally realized that rest is a requirement of perfection. This was a propitious discovery. I now consider my rest as much a part of my work as the work—and since then my work has become much easier— but yet does the apex of perfection remain to be achieved. And besides, even in my sleep, I do more than you while you are awake. So how do you stand so sure, when you have no real leg to stand on, fool? Your balance is a matter of imagination only; you are quite lop-sided.”

Then the ass asked,
“Do you think you will ever reach perfection, Mr. Mills?”
Mills closed his eyes and as he drifted back to sleep, murmured:
“Somebody's got to. Might as well be me. We sure know it won't be you. Now be gone and don't come back.”

There are two kinds of people: those who are dreamers of the future and those who are livers of the present. One is prosaic. One is poetic. One is common. One is uncommon. One is boring. One is a lightning rod for the static electricity of the universe. One believes. One cannot believe. One has faith. One has fear. One is possibility. One is without possibility. One is a leader. One is a follower. No statistic is needed, or even possible, concerning how many there are of the one versus the other. But this is sure: one is rare, and one is common. If one is common, one should try to do something about that, by starting off trying to be uncommon. Common is no way to pass through life. The common should seek some miracle and some wonder. And such can start right here, with these works of literature. They are bona fide. They are fully-accredited by every Chamber of Commerce on planet earth. They are the very real words of a very real writer. If you are a wise soul, they will make sense. If you are a rube, city or farm bred, and no matter how “educated” you may be, they will fly right over your head. To read too far into them will likely cause you, if you are ignorant and full of darkness, to gnash your teeth. But that would be rare, for most who are dark and ignorant do not read too much.

They are first and foremost works of literature, which is another way of saying they are well-beautifully writ and mean something relative to the human condition, versus all the other rubbish designed to be spoon-fed to the shallow mind seeking entertainment. They are honest works and stand on their own; and the mind that can think for itself needs no critic to tell it anything about them. While it is certainly true that the greater portion of people need another they consider smarter than them to tell them what is good, great and right, until their fame becomes a common thing their beautiful obscurity allows them to be found by some few, like the diamond in the mine. They are gemstones set in a golden pail. The savages will scoff at them and throw them in the trash pan. The saints and the civilized will know them for what they are. Mills sought for the world's highest and greatest public office of the people's favorite author, but he was no politician. He did not get along famously with too many men in particular, for their savage, ignorant and cruel nature—always based on selfish, petty ambition—offended him. But he considered the race of man a mighty idea and was all for it. He wrote about the rare best, and used the common worst as true-to-life example. If blunt honesty offends you, you probably won't want to read any further. You will most likely find yourself in these works in the most unflattering of ways. But that's okay. There will always be television, talk radio, murder and crime mysteries, Harlequin romance novels and comic books. Go to them for the easy things. Go to Mills for all the rest.

When asked, at the end of his writing, if he would do it all again, he replied:

“Absolutely not. I did all this to further the race of man along an evolutionary course. I did all this to seek wisdom, beauty and truth, and to share it. And I learned that very few are interested in such things; and the ones who are, mostly will not live it where it counts: in real life. Men are cowards and women are worse. Many do talk that walk, but few walk it. And so we have the story of man: When hyperbole becomes hypocrisy. Now that the population has increased so dramatically and they all have so many others to follow, such a mindset is worse than ever, Ironic, isn't it? They all think themselves leaders of a sort, and yet, all they do is follow. Monkey see, monkey do. Mankind, after all, has not fallen far from the tree. . . So it is that mankind naturally seeks the common denominator. “My neighbor does this; or says this; or is this, and so, too, will I do the same, so that I may fit in and be thought a swell fellow or a good girl.”

Goose-steppers ordinaire.

Humanity is devolving quickly now toward the least while mocking the most. They are herd animals mostly, especially the so-called and self-called leaders; these are mostly managers of the status-quo and are those who would have men in invisible chains, so their own power cannot be truly questioned. This is not leadership. They follow the line of least resistance. They are seekers of a selfish thing. They are egocentric little children that have the money to buy all things their hearts desire, including love. That is a problem. Love is purchasable. Humanity is on a course of suicide as a dominant species. The best they will become, if they continue their course, is a race of geese headed in the wrong direction; toward a sterile, cold environment where what is ignorant and cruel is bandied about as truth while truth and beauty are matters to be read about in books as idle curiosities in between their games. My faith in the human race is lost and all my work a waste of a life that could have been happy had I done anything else but this. My advice to any future truth or beauty seeker is to go jump off a cliff and save yourself the grief. It is not worth it.”
The author sat on his words a moment, then said:

“But. . . There are always the few who are not like the many. And these are worth it. So I guess I would do it again; for they are the ones I aimed to write for all along. They are the only ones who can save this race.”