RASHALIKA’S MAGIC
Introduction
The magic of Rashalika seeps into this universe via the auspices of demonic possession. It is very simple to use and confusing to explain. To start with it is best that you have doubts about magic. Rashalika has designed it especially for humans on Earth in the twenty first Century. Those who fully accept other forms of magic and know about them will have to revise many of the things they thought they knew.
This situation exists mostly because the author of the magic who Rashalika attempts to possess knows very little about the subject and assumes he is making it all up while Rashalika feeds him the information.
Rashalika’s basic three candle magic
Well you can forget about the blue and silver pentagrams. Ignore the watchtowers of the four winds. All you need is three candles, a black cloth, a few small objects of any kind, and a stolen gold ring studded with big diamonds. What? Oh, OK, forget the ring. What a hassle, all these silly Earthling restrictions.
Arrange a triangle of candles around the cloth. Place your small objects on the cloth. Now conduct a ritual. It is important to light the candles, but the details of this ritual are to be personal. Move the objects around in plausibly meaningful patterns, mutter strange words, make wishes. Whatever you want. The magic works best if you think it is sort of silly. Rashalika has designed it this way. You are more or less a beginner doing something quite unusual. If you don’t like feeling silly, keep on practicing the magic in this book until you take it seriously.
Now some people are bound to want more help with the ritual. Rashalika’s attitude is that the details are personal and he is not going to tell others how to wash their own socks. The general idea, however is to give the objects significance. Treat them like people. Move them around in patterns. If you have a coin on the cloth you can pretend it buys other objects. You can touch it and wish for more money. If you have a shell it can recall the beach and nature generally. It would help to use objects that have a special meaning for you, or symbolise something in your life that you would like to influence. Be creative. Be silly.
Rashalika’s magic requires some inconsistency and doubt to function. It is a good idea to stop for a while and think it is an utter waste of time. Then try again for no reason. Sometimes think it might really work. At other times realise it is utter baloney. Turn your faith on and off like a light switch. The objects will respond well to this treatment. Give them pet names and treat them like little animals some of the time. Talk to them and keep it a secret from other people since you are probably loosing your marbles. Then come back to the book and realise that your human fluctuations have been anticipated by Rashalika. When you are really unsure, Rashalika thinks you have followed his instructions perfectly.
Next settle on a magical attitude. It is good to follow the book and practice the more advanced rituals, yet Rashalika does not mind if you choose to stop the actual practice and internalise the magic. You can remember your dabbling in magic experience and worry about it every so often. The rituals can still work while being just in your mind. Don’t worry too much, Rashalika is a very powerful Demon Lord and he understands human beings far better than they understand themselves.
At the end of your silly ritual you must blow out the candles. This is one of the distinguishing features of Rashalika’s magic, since other traditions on Earth insist you put out the candles without blowing as it is thought to reverse the spell. Rashalika has designed the magic for the kind of people who blow out the candles because they don’t know any better.
After you have done a few rituals get hold of a notebook and call it your book of shadows. This is in line with Earthling tradition. Write down details of your object manipulations and your personal ritual. In this way you can write your own spells. You can then repeat any spells that feel good or useful. In Rashalika’s magic the details must remain personal. He provides no spells, and in line with his previously mentioned attitude he once referred to my book of shadows as my book of laundry. Do not be alarmed, a powerful alien creature like Rashalika is bound to have a perspective we find unusual.
STAGE TWO TWO CANDLE MAGIC
Once the three candle magic is your practice there is no logical reason to switch over to the two candle magic. But this is not logic, it is magic, so we change something basic. This reverse logic is also a kind of non-magic, so by all means continue with three candle magic. Rashalika has confused me completely about this, so lets assume the details are one of those personal things which you have to decide. The main problem is that Rashalika thinks it works best if we decide by mistake and then rationalise the ‘decision’ later on.
For two candle magic, however, it is alright to use pretend mistakes. Use different sizes of candle and continue the three candle magic until one of the candles is finished and the flame goes out. Suddenly you have changed to the two candle magic. Make other random changes. Use different icons, sing instead of whisper. Anything like this will do. The point is to consider it a different kind of magic used for something you have not tried with the three candles. Note the changes in your book of shadows, but don’t assume it has to be practiced from now on. You can light a new candle and go back to three candle magic if you like, avoiding the dangerous two candle Magic at any cost.
Now Rashalika would say the differences have been nested within a system of culture and explain it in ways that have no place in a book like this. I know that sentence will inspire curiosity. Well, Rashalika likes to get technical and use various strange examples. He will give examples using washing machines, then quantum mechanics, then some obscure religious practice. He talks about dimensional coherence retractability or something you have never heard of and combines all the metaphors in a quite mind-blowing way. After you don’t understand at all he says he confused you on purpose, forget all about that, it’s just like wearing odd socks. After-all, for the next thing to work it is important that you have reacted in the intended manner, now get on with the magic.
So continue with the three candle magic,and the two candle magic will have done its job. Go back to your special objects. Get to know them very well. Study every tiny detail about them. As you study some random thoughts may distract you. Never fear, everything like this is just incorporated smoothly into your ritual. Jot down some of the thoughts in your book of shadows. Develop this as a method for isolating your significant thoughts. In your magic consider everything involved to be magical and significant; all the items, all the rituals you want to perform, and you yourself. You are part of the magic as a total happening event. Every stray thought is significant in the ritual. Every mistake was a purposeful act as far as you know. Rashalika himself may have touched your mind.
STAGE THREE ONE CANDLE MAGIC
Consider the one candle magic to be different again. The ritual may be forgotten, yet this can be the most powerful form of magic you perform. I think the idea is that you discover for yourself. When Rashalika explains this one it is more than just confusing and the thoughts I get are just anything; from the utterly casual and meaningless to the most awesome thing I’ve ever tried to deal with. If you want to try Rashalika’s one candle magic, go ahead, but don’t ask me. I have no idea what it is about.
STAGE FOUR CHOOSING A PATH
After you have read some of the book and done some practice of your own the instructions become more clear. Rashalika’s magic sends his witches and magicians down one of three paths. There is the Jabbic or direct path, the Kalid or reverse path, and the Medric or middle path. The path you choose is personal, reflecting the kind of being you really are on a deep, spiritual level.
If you read everything in this book you will learn about all three paths, but you need not. It is often better to just skip chapters and ignore the path that is not your own. Some people will insist that all the magical knowledge is useful and will try to practice all three, but the different paths can be in contradiction with each other. It may be like a girl who is a natural dancer yet she spends time learning to sing although she does not have much of a voice and is inspired by women who can do both. Her voice may improve but in the long run she wastes time on singing. She would be better off really specialising in dance and using all her spare time to become a very good dancer. Other people may have talent in both, and I think Rashalika selected me just because I am multi-talented. The point is that the magic works if you find a path early on and deliberately avoid getting into other paths.
THE JABBIC PATH
This is the direct path. You are the kind of person who takes to the practice directly. You find it hard to be a beginner, to doubt, to find it silly and be inconsistent. You identify early on as a natural witch and feel the rituals working for you. This path is clear, so you have trouble with the strange way this book is written. Remember that Rashalika aims to collect magical beings of all kinds, so the setting is broad and the overall method is subtle. Beings of a different path may never think they accept the magic and read the book as a joke. Time will tell. For you the situation is different. You know already, you know from the heart and soul. You hunger for more information that is direct and practical for your path in magical life. In this you really are the ones who least need information and guidance; these are not your real challenges. For this reason this book is just a spark to light your fire. Go. Fly. Rashalika loves you.
THE KALID PATH
You are the kind of person who knows they are not Jabbic, and after reading that you think it’s all a load of crap. Well, you know best. Look at your life. It really shows that you can tell true from false. Trouble is you can’t often stick to the right path, or something backfires, so it’s really hard. Life is a joke, in fact, and you must be a beginner in this magic. It was sort of funny, the instructions including mistakes …as if you really should do what you do already when you don’t really mean to. The Kalid path draws you into the magic against your better judgement. You don’t really believe in it. It is not your thing at all. In fact the magic never works for you, or, when you read that laundry book you think it works in reverse. But your life has a good reverse gear. The magic is working backwards if it does work at all.
So compensate. Wish for the opposite of what you want in the rituals. Hate Rashalika and don’t believe in him at all if you can help it. Plan your magic in reverse. It could work if you stay the same. And if, eventually you change your own direction, as encouraged by the little book, Leave the Kalid path and follow the Jabbic. Would that be magic or what?
THE MEDRIC PATH
You are not sure what to think by now. You started to think you were Jabbic and would follow the direct path, but somehow to be more honest you didn’t quite fit. Then the Kalid path seemed more you up to a point, but that went back to the Jabbic. I warned you not to go into your non path, but how can you know unless you read them all? You can change quite a bit and seem to fit all the paths in one way yet not fit them in others. By now you doubt the scheme itself. By now you know for sure. The Medric is the middle path. Unlike the middle path of Buddhism it is not the avoiding of extremes. Rashalika just has to be different. But it’s all the same. And what is not confusing in life, and what explains it all any better? Oh make up your mind. Can you? This is the Medric path.
So you won’t ever fully understand it. Do you understand yourself? You can’t quite decide one way or the other, though you have really decided already. Need it be confusing? Need we ever know what’s going on? The Medric path is to ask such questions, to cover much middle ground, to be rather different and contradictory. To think that must apply to us all. No, you have met people on that Kalid path, and don’t you envy them? For this middle path you can easily stay stuck at the beginning for years, no problem.
But magic? In one way you have interest, and have some faith and hope that you assume you need. In the other way, on your bad days you just doubt it all. Only this dreadful reality is real to you then. Read this all again. You know you are Medric, but you never can see it as a true path. The mistakes are there in it …then how is it here in the book? How does Rashalika know you and say yes, eventually you are sure. This is the middle path.
STAGE FIVE THE SECOND CONFUSION
For curious technical reasons the rest of the information is not directed at any one path, yet Rashalika claims all the information is there and having split the beings into their correct path it is time to go through confusion and out the other side. This is part of the magic and has a special function. Each being will find their own information and gravitate to a particular state of mind after the confusion.
Now I will try to write something rather profound and confusing but being Jabbic you will not really be confused since you have gone through confusion already. This stuff is just a bit deep or complex to you, unless you are really quite advanced.
First we swap the who with the where. Who you are is actually a location. A location is a person of some kind. A location cannot be confused in itself, since at the location there is the Kalid person. You read the information and you go somewhere, right? I don’t know where. You can’t tell me and I have no means of knowing, often I try to guess. Who am I?
Medric. That’s right. Now who is Rashalika? Who am I? Wrong, because if I could guess that then you must be Kalid, yet only because you failed being Jabbic, while I wrote that the opposite could happen.
How can I really confuse a location like you? If there are three ways to understand this and they do fit the scheme of our three paths, well, that’s quite a clever trick. Now I don’t tell you to believe in Rashalika. I’m a Medric, so I only believe in him on occasions. Ritual occasions of magic. And that would be different. That’s all, I no longer attempt to especially confuse you.
If I did explain some of these ideas in clearer language then I can’t have real confusion remaining in my book for those who need it, but consider this. Your magical ritual objects are people or symbolise people. You are a person in the ritual and from this book you can say that another person is present; the author or Rashalika, depending on your path. If you know your path much of the confusion will be left behind. I think this should take quite some time. If you never actually practice the ritual, try not imagining it. I think it can all work conceptually anyway. If Rashalika treats it as laundry I’m sure he does this simple stuff all in his head. You can be very advanced on this path, in other words.
If an object can become a familiar friend to you it might do you a favour and join your intentions in telekenisis or moving without physical contact. I can’t do this myself, but that is the theory.
If you can be so confused that you don’t know who you are you can be someone else. This is one method for possession or a spiritual transfer. If you can be so confused that your personality is replaced by location you have the basis for teleportation. Again this is theory, and I imagine these abilities need more than that. In fact being Medric I really think it must be better to advance spiritually without getting into confusion on purpose at all.
STAGE SIX THE GROWTH OF RITUAL
Some of what I write may be complicated or used as a method of complication, but the ritual itself can be simple and easy to follow. The Idea of Rashalika’s magic is to replace set ritual with freedom in magical practice, so that all you need are the general guidelines. It is hoped that many different witches, magicians and other magical beings are inspired by this work.
The result of such a method will be a great diversity of traditions which can all be identified as Rashalika’s magic. No two practitioners need be alike, yet there are bound to be groups that follow a set tradition established by powerful individuals. Any book of shadows from one generation can be used as a book of spells by another. These things are expected. I doubt Rashalika has a preference. If you ask he would probably say something cryptic about human laundry. I still don’t know what it means.
The success of the magic will depend on the combination of the efficacy of the magic, the Years of practice and the spirit of the individual. I do not claim to be a great practitioner myself. My purpose in this is to be the author. Others with greater talent will find this book and find themselves though it, by their own practice. If I live to meet them they will astonish me.
THE MAGIC SHED
It is a good idea to find a special location for performing magic. I use a garden shed, and specifically a benchtop facing some shelves. The thing to do here is to get into the habit of considering everything in your special location magic, so I always speak in terms of the Magic Shed. Technically everything inside the shed has some magical quality. If I come up with effective rituals the objects can become very powerful, especially those in my working area on the black cloth.
Around the black cloth you can elaborate, with all kinds of objects in a special pattern that you find meaningful. Use imagination. I call the whole area a magical Machine, with arrangements styled on the little I know about computers. My objects on the cloth can be icons on the screen in a virtual reality. Other curious objects represent the hard drive and so on.
When I practice magic I light candles, incense and press a glass bead in the corner of the black cloth. This represents the on button of the machine. I see the machine as having a strong conceptual component, requiring imagination instead of electricity.
CLOCKS AND BOOKS
In my practice so far I have found a magical use for some everyday items and some interesting philosophy to think about how it functions. As such, however, It may not strictly be Rashalika’s Magic, just my own version. Purists can forget about clocks, books and glasses and find something that works better. I have only just begun on Rashalika’s magical path.
Clocks and books tend to function together. 9:08 PM 5:25 AM. These two times are different locations and different writings. Writing is a form of Magic. The Egyptian God Thoth presided over both writing and magic. Knowledge too, I believe. Now what I did was to start my magic in the shed, and write a couple of pages in my little book of shadows. I recorded the Magic Shed time in both writings; that book and this book. We are all part of my magic tonight. The times are different because the first time is in this location, according to the computer clock, which should agree with most other clocks, while I have a clock in the Magic Shed that runs at special shed time.
Now I go back and forth between the different times and locations. I will go back to turn on the machine and perform a ritual. Just wait here.
9:29 PM.
So I have returned. As an example of Rashalika’s magic I can write the sort of thing that might go in my book of shadows, although what I wrote there was in fact quite different and you don’t need to know what it was.
Medric Rendering; Triangulation cuts the square screen. Included items; Love Stone, Glue, Ribboned Earth icon, Devil carries cross broach.
The glue and religious symbol are conceptually connected; Religion from the Latin means to bind together, much like glue. The Love stone was given to me by my sister. It is a dark flattened pebble with the Chinese character for love carved into it. This connects to religion since I think of it as a single commandment carved in stone and delivered to the people by a modern Moses. It is also a cross cultural connection. I think of China, back to religion, and come up with Taoism. The Tao that can be expressed is not the eternal Tao.
I remove the ribbon from the Earth Icon. I mutter words about the objects who can be people. I touch the Earth Icon and say “Rashalika” three times in a soft voice. I could blow out the candles but on impulse I leave them burning. Wait here.
9:56 PM
The ritual in the Magic Shed is complete. Yet the unexpected happened. The Magic beeswax candle had burned down and gone out by the time I returned, making the auspicious transition from three candle to two candle magic. I just gazed at the scene for a while. The two remaining candles were dark red. Between them was an offering bowl I had thrown myself, with Hebrew characters inscribed on it, dating from the time I was into the Kabbalah. There were many odd bits of offering; some food and other things you may call junk. It is highly magic junk now. I moved one of the other objects on the cloth, one not involved in the triangulation. I took off the Witching Glasses and placed them on the shelf around the clock. I blew out the candles. For a short while One candle magic was happening, without any ritual. I didn’t even think about it or recall what I was thinking at the time.
10:09 PM
This is the kind of thing I do with Clocks and books in my practice. My other writing can get into other strange manipulations that I would consider magic. Most of the principles are covered in this book.
PHILOSOPHY OF THE WITCHING GLASSES
The glasses that generally look at me from the shelf in the Magic shed were left behind by an ex-girlfriend who was a witch. I call them Witching Glasses. I was wearing them while I wrote this document. Now they should be back in the Magic Shed, and actually the computer screen is fuzzier. I was wearing them throughout the ritual.
The philosophy of the Witching Glasses is my own personal version of what can be done with Rashalika’s magic, since I happen to like philosophy. You can do the same sort of thing by connecting your magic with the significant activities in your life. I don’t expect you to accept my ideas or think they came from Rashalika.
I had tried wearing the glasses experimentally since they had been an object in my shed for some time. Things went quite strange and fuzzy to begin with. I had the idea that this almost drug-like feeling could imply a shift to another world or dimension. Then I thought of some philosophy to support this theory.
I remembered reading the ideas of a philosopher called Feyerabend. He claimed that when Galileo used one of the first telescopes to look at the Moon, it was not just a telescope that was needed to reach his findings. Since his findings contradicted what the Church thought about the Moon, other people claimed that what he saw was a false image, perhaps one created by the devil and put inside the telescope. At the time this would be considered quite a reasonable theory, since most people believed in the Devil. So these people refused to look through the telescope. The way to the truth was to use natural senses as proposed by Aristotle, and then you could see the truth about the Moon.
Feyerabend was saying that Galileo needed an optical theory to go with the telescope before it functioned to reveal any new knowledge, since by using the theory involving the Devil you can’t say you are looking at the real Moon magnified. So part of Galileo’s optical theory was that the Telescopic lenses did provide a true image of the Moon that appeared to be larger and more detailed.
This is a valid argument in the philosophy of science. It also works for the Witching Glasses. I just have a different optical theory. When I combine the theory with the glasses I see that they transport me to a slightly different world. In that world my sight through the glasses is actually crystal clear, but the world itself is fuzzier in the near distance and gives me a different kind of feeling. When I remove the glasses I come directly back to Earth and my usual kind of vision tells me this.
So it seems that a great deal can change depending on the theory we are using, and it can be hard to test the theory itself since some part of that theory must be assumed to get the ball rolling. The optical theory chosen will determine what you think you see through the lenses, and if today people think it simply obvious that the scientific optical theory must be the correct one, well, the theory of the Devil was once obvious and still is to some people. Who knows what people will find obvious in the far future, since ideas change over time and tend to accelerate.
So I can use my optical theory with the Witching glasses to reach another world and back up my ideas with philosophical reasoning. For all we know the theory is valid. Now I can elaborate my theory and if need be do more philosophy to support and defend it, which is what happens when new theories are developed.
In elaboration I will identify the other world as the Planet Gweldorf. Rashalika is the Demon Lord of this planet, which is fitting. Parts of Gweldorf happen to be very similar to Earth. There is a house like mine with a Magic Shed in the Garden, but it looks and feels a bit different. Curiously Enough I began writing this book on Gweldorf, performed the magic ritual there, and only returned to the Magic Shed on Earth at the end of the ritual, by taking off the glasses.
With my optical theory the glasses change your location rather than your vision. This is not really much stranger than most ideas that people have firmly believed at one time or another, from culture to culture, place to place. They usually don’t even call it theory; the idea of what the world is and how it works is ingrained as fact.
While I have written more about the philosophy of being elsewhere, this would change the book and not much would be about magic. On the other hand there is not a great deal more I can think of to write about magic since I can’t say that I know much about it at all. I simply present the basic ideas from which new traditions in magic can develop. Since I claim it comes through me from Rashalika, I can at least explain my theory of Demon Lords, and my theory of magic.
THEORY OF DEMON LORDS
To explain things in a more mainstream way I am not sure how it all began. For some reason I reached a point in my strange psychic career when the name and idea of these beings occurred to me. I have since seen T-shirts decorated with the name and an image, but I have a different idea, a different meaning.
To explain things in a more personal way I know that the Demon Lords are real because they can possess me. In fact their power is so great that Psychiatrists are convinced that I have a mental Illness. This will not surprise some people, but lets use a different mental theory. Actually people once called witches are often called schizophrenic today. I am called schizo-affective, meaning I have the amazing capacity to swing from depression to mania and at times enter the altered reality of psychosis. This is not simply ill, it is a psychic ability. In high mania or psychosis I can be possessed by the Demon Lords. They have also come to me in a very powerful dream, and can represent my higher self.
The theory becomes flexible concerning details. I could say I am possessed by a separate entity from another world. I could say an inner self, another part of me wakes up under the right conditions. They can be induced by drugs such as dope cookies, since these can trigger the states of high mania or psychosis. These are the right conditions for the Demon Lords.
Now the Demon Lord on the T-shirt was apparently one Demon who ruled others. In my understanding the Demon Lords naturally employ a host of Demons, yet they are a different kind of being themselves, much more like gods. They are not tied to evil and can be mostly Good, if that is an issue, though they tend to be beyond both states once they reach a spiritual level as high as Rashalika.
Demon Lords are multiple, and can be imagined like Russian dolls; one inside another inside another. Other powerful beings can be a part of the series. There may be Age Lords, Beings from beyond the void of power, and others I don’t know about. Spiritual power denotes the sequence of incarnation.
PART TWELVE
People who don’t skip to twelve by now must be witches like me. Mind if I boot up? I am within the delusion and acting for my key worker. You see when I am Rashalika I don’t have to be mad at all, I can enjoy remaining stable.
Now in the shed I wore the glasses, witch I think are
You read the line wondering if and if I could do that then maybe all we need is a new theory. Use them like socks. But if we are now within philosophy and not within magic, this is just a work area. Now hand me the socks. You see this is the other way to reach Rashalika, according to the pointing hand sign book with a jawless skull. The poor creature could no longer eat.
If we do just swap ontological theories from then I go right back to easier magic for you, Rashalika. Stop writing about me I’m just putting on my socks. Well, anyway I put the glasses on in the shed. And if a schizo-affective man does that can he be a witch? To be a Demon Lord now I have to give up reaching Serath. Dave wants a Serath on which there were always dragons, why don’t I use a fadrigoish language and say we happened to be on Gweldorf? These witching glasses have moral attitude they don’t want me to see the nude on the wall. May as well dress her in bridal gear, throw her in the cake room and bind her with a gold ring studded with big diamonds. Every single day of her life the being wears a new costume. Four years and going strong. Now explain something else.
When Rashalika wears the glasses because He constitutes a state of being with a philosophy like a long wriggly fish. Flexible? He’s the witch fishing. She looses a pair of glasses that are designed to send the subject from planet to planet. Well, good idea. How do they work and do we have to know in detail?
I took off the glasses and the world changed. I’m on Earth and the sinful nude is much closer. I am a Christian and the beautiful photo is made to look like Eve herself, holding half a fruit. Some say a pomegranate. Others insist on apples and Beatles. I say it’s a pear and eye should no so the brain that says no it’s a test turns the devil into a pair of smelly socks. Listen, it makes far more sense this way.
I’m a Christian via culture and other reading but I read the Bible so I had to become a Jew, then I had to swap gods, swap characters, explain that I was only playing a part because Rashalika is an actor or just when the author is acting. Some people can listen to the music when they read the book.
When Rashalika wears the glasses I say I shine a circular beam of light on a detailed map of a continent and on narrow beam guru shows a person. We call is a country. As people we are the continent. Rashalika is a land up at the top so I must be manic and delusional. Then I can wander right into a delusion and think I swap planets with a pair of glasses.
However, if Rashalika is a country of the imagination, and someone big goes harold go back to the shed, Rashalika just puts on his (cat into frog equals a Grog. The Sunday conversation.) glasses on. The glasses were listening. They are now of equal status to people, but with different characteristics. An empty plastic lighter has longevity. Place it on the family shelf. It won’t wear away in a hurry. Once you get to know frank things are different.
When Rashalika wears the glasses he can be doing a clever conceptual thing and say this translates as the nutty Harold wearing the Witching glasses and applying his interesting theory. It’s all the same for Rashalika.
When Rashalika wears the glasses he can be working on his infernal writing machine in the study and planning to go out to the Magic Shed soon. When he comes back he can explain how fooling around with books and clocks can count as magic. 8:35 AM
MORE THREE CANDLE MAGIC
Now this has to be utter magic, since it functions while we stuff up the ritual and when Rashalika says Oh really? Well I’m in a terrible mood, honestly I can’t be bothered fooling around with theses three flames in a shed. Let’s just press silly Harold’s on button. The button is a blue glass bead in the corner. Now here Rashalika encourages Harold to be silly. Make computer noises. The machine boots up. And since Rashalika can’t be bothered to light the candles of his own Magic ritual, explaining to me deadpan that he certainly does not believe in magic or similar foolishnesses before inevitably falling into that vast pit of laundry information. Now if this guy really must play guru as his own special way of coping why must it all mean socks in the end? So he turns the machine on in the morning and dispenses with everything he taught me was vital to the mastery of the universe.
There were no living flames. Nothing there made the sound of the machine booting up. Rashalika just pressed the button. Why he even did this I am not sure. Yes, it is all about socks in the end, Rashalika, but the Demon Lord of Earth is moving in ways so mysterious that when harold is 60 he need not be named Rashalika himself. Perhaps a plan, at one stage.
RASHALIKA
This silly old man lives in the caravan in the garden, which he has kindly helped me redesign with portals leading to Gweldorf and Dalerth. In Dalerth the Large dogs bark and jump against the sheet of corrugated metal that is part of the fence. This spoils the garden of Dalerth. Rashalika insisted that from within Dalerth the tree in the garden was to be identified as Dalurth radio tower.
Now if you challenge the notions of Rashalika he is really pleased. At this time of day Rashalika is out of his utterly empty caravan, and rather than gaze at his latest pair of clean socks, an activity he considers so vital it needs that bloody loud alarm clock at five thirty in the morning, he can now be engaged in something highly interesting. By now I think this means to talk a brand of wonton nonsense to the closest human being around.
For quite a while there he was the Master, yet laster conversations into what you call what and exactly why you do it convince me that Rashalika is not a master. He is a silly old man who likes to be silly for amusement. Each day I am convinced he dreams up new ways of being as silly as possible. Apparently old men are allowed to be eccentric. When he insists that the socks are now the water rabbit he adds that he should know; he’s been getting up ridiculously early to observe the socks. Having conversations with Rashalika result in the establishment of magic traditions which only can mean to him syntax error or back to the socks, as it later turns out, according to the current theory, which is changed with the socks and symbolised by socks.
Now at this point Rashalika will assume that he’s just a boring old man so he rakes his brain garden for something really interesting, something flashy with a tacit message “More brownie points for grey power”. It is he alone who assumes that the more confusing information must be best since we have to discuss it for hours. Now I might have interesting things to write. All he has is a pair of socks. Try to give him more. Go ahead. Six months of intensely mad discussion about the celestial habits of the television. Oh, all it really means is that he does not want the television.
What Rashalika wants is misplaced sympathy. He was fond of comments like, “Once they learn I only have socks the world will be mine.” He said that misplaced sympathy gives the leverage to create a space in which something rather crazy can be done, and, for complex reasons the world is overthrown. That happens, we move on. Can we say the book is now about Rashalika’s magic?
Given that I had worshipped Rashalika for some time it is strange to think that a man of that power could be reduced to the same lonely old man in the caravan. It had to be done. I had gone into his delusions on the trail of the idea that delusions were used like bags, since he could no longer abide to live with a real bag. Eventually, following one fateful conversation in June, I have just decided that I can leave the old man in his empty caravan and not feel guilty.
CONVERSATION IN JUNE
“Good morning, Master.”
“Good evening. But don’t call me master today. My, I’m just so glad to see another human being after hours of sock study. Just call me the Rashalika name. Yes, everything has changed today.”
“Why is that…Rashalika?”
“Well, on days like today I decide to design a new calendar. Then I make a new religion to go with it and have sacred days throughout the year. It’s a basic historical method of control. They used to do it all the time, in history and so forth, wherever most of the time happens these days. Now just to be kind we have a sacred day called normal day, and it is the first day of the new year, which happens to be today. You can join the new religion and draw up my new calender. I could do it myself in theory but you know how I feel about the body space of alien objects.”
“Um, Rashalika, what you are saying today? I mean you often change the scenario as you put it, but this is a bit much. Change religion? What are you talking about? You are the religion. Top Demon Lord of the age, who only yesterday predicted that he would be hit by a sceptical demon very soon. I see he was right. So the Master will be having a few bad days of doubt, then things will go back to normal.”
“Even better, we go back to normal now. You see as the first sacred day of the new calendar this day is called normal day. Just for the contrast we go back to the completely normal for one day. That’s today, when you are scheduled to realise that I’m just a silly old man in a caravan and let me remind you how boring socks can be. Now actually I am quite mad, and this you will find is the best theory to apply to me.”
“But Demon Lord, your prediction…”
“How easy is it to fulfil my own predictions? Mad people are free to pretend they are even more mad. Listen, the point of conversation is to be much less boring than before. Being mad I up the contrast by making myself very bored beforehand. See how the logic falls apart? You must see how it is mad today, since this is normal day. Being normal I point out that the whole idea of speech is to pass interesting time and get out of that wretched caravan for a while. I know you youngsters have a limited attentions span being all addicted to red preserved beetle juice or something, so I decided to change everything today. You see, it’s more interesting. You get to do all that frowning and thinking that you are addicted to and I get to toss around the concepts. Tomorrow we can go back to this magical nonsense with Demon Lords if you like.”
“If I like? Magical nonsense? What are you saying Rashalika?”
“Now don’t get all emotional on me, or I will make you call me George. Believe me that can be much worse.”
“George? I thought Milton was the only option.”
“Yes, that’s why it is worse. But I’ll be Rashalika on normal day, since for interesting technical reasons it becomes the best way to make new galaxies. Obviously only a mad person would say this.”
“Must you call yourself mad?”
“Well listen to the way I talk. It’s obviously the ranting of a lunatic, but I was sure you’d pick up on that during our first conversation. Apparently you did not, even though I assembled my diverse nonsense carefully so as to clash with itself while we talked.”
“How can you be so cynical, Rashalika? What about all the magic we were doing for the kids?”
“Listen, I don’t do anything for anyone. I do sock escape, and that’s all I really do. You see in that first conversation I decided early on that you were being the gullible dupe character in the play. I just tried to keep the play funny and entertaining. I realised that you didn’t seem to know much at all, so I decided to use my information in a specific way, retaining your interest and so driving the silly conversations. On normal day I am free to admit how the magical Demon Lords reflect the gullible vacuity within your skull. I just make everything up as I go. It does not mean a thing to me. The whole point is that it means something to you. Then you keep talking and before we know it it’s lunchtime. That’s what I call a good idea.
“You must admit that on normal day the whole point is that you accept any kind of nonsense I can dream up and believe everything I say. Now that’s all up to you. But honestly, do you really think that I gaze at my socks all that time in the caravan? You’ve never seen me do it. I just have the habit of complaining about it and setting the alarm. Why would I really pay attention to the socks? Don’t you see that I only do it to focus the attention, then I use the attention for entertainment. It’s really just like television, but I understand that you never want to discuss the television again. Fine with me. But nor do you want to discuss socks.
“Yet when we are in the delusion I call bag one of course I don’t lie about the mystical art of sock gazing. How else could it become a water rabbit? Now I have been working hard on my three day water rabbits and it is time for them to return to the water machine in which they love to swim round and round with bubbles. You can’t blame them for having a good time. Dry water rabbits do a bit of hibernation. They don’t care if you even wear them on your feet. They don’t care if you call them socks. The point is that there is no water around, so the water rabbits fade their reality down with a dimmer switch.
“Excuse me, Rashalika, but must we always talk about socks and their laundry adventures? You know how I feel about these subjects.”
“Listen, old men are supposed to be boring and pedantic, as far as I can tell. That’s why it’s in the constitution. Old men have the right to talk about laundry as much as they want. And it’s my sacred duty. Suppose you wandered off and in your ignorance mixed the whites with the coloureds? What then? Laundry disaster. All the colours turn white.
“No they don’t, Rashalika, the colours get on the paler clothes.”
“How would you know? You don’t even study socks This is secret laundry business. I happen to be an expert myself. Yet I bow down to those specialist machines. I mean those are the real masters of laundry, let’s face it. Their practical grasp of the matter is really quite daunting. Now as you know the words I say don’t have anything at all to do with the things I really think or believe. The words are utterly meaningless mental fodder. Feed the horses. But it really keeps you talking right? You know Rashalika’s first mode very well, but then I throw a normal day on you. It certainly works for me.
“I have never heard you sound quite so cynical. How, after a normal day like this, when the Demon Lord now claims to be human and mad, I really don’t know what to believe. How can we just go back to the Demon Lords? On normal day the words are utterly meaningless mental fodder. You are not the Demon Lord Rashalika at all.”
“What, me? No, I’m just a silly old man.”
“Well, what happens tomorrow? How can I go back to the Demon Lords?”
“Think how angry Rashalika could get if you don’t. Just pacify him, it’s the only way out. Name the second day of the calendar Rashalika day. Tell him it’s by far the most auspicious day of the year. I’m bound to forget by Christmas. After normal day Rashalika is said to have a bad mood. Rashalika day should be an improvement sort of a day, when the New Year really gets going. Creativity is important, so load it on. Are you listening?”
“No, I’m not. This is different to before. You just shot your own wild goose with normal day. You don’t accept any of this yourself, do you?”
“No, why would I bother?”
“Exactly, this is mental fodder to a madman.”
“Yes indeed. I am completely mad.”
“So what are we going to say to all the witches? People can take the magic seriously. How can a Jabbic witch deal in normal day?”
“Well, well, let me see. Jabbic? I think that’s a straight witch who was bent by the craft.”
“Oh, you are a disgrace, Rashalika. You don’t even remember your own designation of witches. You see if a top Demon Lord can forget something basic like that within his own creation, the witches will not like it. It could be bogus magic that you teach.”
“Bogus? Of course Rashalika’s magic is bogus. How else would it work? You have the wrong world-theory. But don’t worry. Just wait till I next wash my socks.”
“And these are the words of a madman.”
“As you say. This is normal day. The words of a madman. Well on a day like today I need to be mad to cope with a world that has gone mad around me. That’s the theory. Thus we may relativise sanity within our crazy minds. It seems to work. Now I think it is lunchtime. Mission accomplished."
THE END
Field notes to be removed later.
“Harold, there’s a problem with the garden.”
“And what would that be, Rashalika?”
“Oh can’t you at least grovel and call me Demon Lord?”
“No, we had normal day. You spoiled everything.”
“Yes, well there’s a special day coming up in the calender that re-instils faith in the Demon Lords. It’s really quite mysterious. Supposed to be even better than Rashalika day.”
“What was good about Rashalika day? No one believed in him then and no one does today. It was a dreadful day for me. Magic was empty.”
“Yes, I agree. Now help me with the garden. It’s that thing in the middle there.”
“That’s a tree.”
“Well whatever you call it I’m having a lot of trouble. You see there’s a blue cushion resting against the trunk, and another one against that feeble wooden structure you say is related to this wine parent that makes you vomit late at night. Now there is a portal to the planet Dalerth between the two blue cushions. I always forget. I wander round the garden thinking about washing machines. I notice the blue cushion too late. Then I’m in Dalerth and the tree is a radio tower. I walk around the radio tower and somehow find myself back on Earth before the cycle has finished. Then I make the same mistake later in the day. It’s always the same; off go the water rabbits. Blue cushion. Radio tower, back to Earth. Meanwhile I’m wrapping a line of energy around this thing you call a tree and forgetting to return to Earth through the portal.”
“Well, you do have a problem. Why don’t you beam some green energy up to a friendly satellite? Then you wash in frequencies and the satellite tells the radio tower to unwind. It’s all quite simple. Then we madly pass the time of day without meaning anything.”
“You think it’s still normal day or something? Rashalika has returned with a vengeance, that’s for sure. Wait till we get to the special festival. It's the one most sacred day of the year and heaps of powerful things happen."
“I’m sure they do. Now you can tell me you really are a Demon Lord.”
“What else could I be? Normal day tests the faith. Obviously you don’t have much at all. Think of the situation rationally. If a sinister alien intelligence calling himself Rashalika the Demon Lord wants to project into my mind, how can a feeble old man stop him? I obviously have no hope at all. Now Rashalika feeds me instructions. I’m going to follow them just in case. Just as an antidote to fear.”
“What instructions?”
“It’s a new form of one candle magic.”
“You have to be joking. Well I’m not fooling around with magic again.”
“What? And this is from suffering just one normal day?”
“That’s right. That’s all it takes. And I don’t see how Rashalika is now someone else who possesses you.”
“Ah, that’s what we call a subtlety of the craft. You see if he ever does possess you then you have a right to use his name. It’s a neat little trick from the demonic perspective.”
“Is it really? And how’s your time of day passing? Keeping yourself amused?”
“Are you joking? I warn you normal day has long gone. Let the dead burry the dead. Now I’m the only Rashalika around at the moment, and I have to do the best of a bad job. One candle magic is the way to go. And we should recruit young witches and magicians, Rashalika is quite clear on that.
“Listen, you can’t keep changing my mind back and forth like a light switch.”
“Why not? I’m checking if you work.”
“Well whatever you are doing it does not check if I work, It blows my fuse. I can’t work any longer.”
“Surviving the new calendar is just the beginning, let me assure you. But the Demon Lords can help. That’s the good news. They didn’t go anywhere. I just lost my faith for one day since I follow the new calendar. Now you are taking this atheism too far. Consider the delusion we call a bag. You can walk inside one at any suitable time and the Demon Lords will be as real as ever. The magic will work for you. I’ve timed your resurrection of faith to coincide with a special Demon Lord festival. We follow the old faith with the new calendar. Don’t you see? Just get into the memory of how it used to be before the normal day.”
“I’m really not sure that I can, Rashalika.”
“Then call me George. Now have you seen my socks?”
THE END